Preferences.h and pubsubclient.h not working

I have a weird problem (or I might be an idiot).
I have a basic sketch that sets basic things about my system using preferences. It sets wifi ssid, wifi password, mqtt server, mqtt username mqtt password into preferences . In this way I can then push new images via ota and the new images can be on a public cloud and the source code can be public as well.
Now to the problem. I set the things above and when I push the following image to the device connecting to the wifi works like a charm but not connecting to the mqtt broker. If I then comment out everything regarding Prefrences and mqtt, and add servername, username and password in the code (the now comment out section) it works. As you see I print the server name and user to serial and it looks just fine. I am using hivemq is that effecting anything (probably...).
What can be wrong?

#include <WiFi.h>
#include <PubSubClient.h>
#include <WiFiClientSecure.h>
#include <ArduinoJson.h>
#include <Preferences.h>
//---- WiFi settings
Preferences preferences;
const char* ssid = "";
const char* password = "";
//---- MQTT Broker settings
//If I hardcode the servername, username and password it works
const char* mqtt_server = "";
//const char* mqtt_server = "******************.eu.hivemq.cloud";
const char* mqtt_username = "";
//const char* mqtt_username = "******";
const char* mqtt_password = "";
//const char* mqtt_password = "********";

//Device attr
const char* device_type = "sprinkler";
const char* location = "garden";
const char* device_name = "sprinkler1";

const int mqtt_port = 8883;

WiFiClientSecure espClient;
PubSubClient client(espClient);
unsigned long lastMsg = 0;

#define MSG_BUFFER_SIZE (50)
char msg[MSG_BUFFER_SIZE];


static const char* root_ca PROGMEM = R"EOF(
-----BEGIN CERTIFICATE-----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=
-----END CERTIFICATE-----
)EOF";

void setup() {
  Serial.begin(9600);
  preferences.begin("settings", false);
  String WIFI_SSID = preferences.getString("WIFI_SSID", "");
  String WIFI_SECRET = preferences.getString("WIFI_SECRET", "");
  String SETTING_MQTT_SERVER = preferences.getString("MQTT_SERVER", "");
  String SETTING_MQTT_USER = preferences.getString("MQTT_USER", "");
  String SETTING_MQTT_PASSWORD = preferences.getString("MQTT_PASSWORD", "");
  String TEST = preferences.getString("tesr", "");
  preferences.end();
  Serial.println();
  Serial.println("###############################################");
  Serial.println("Settings: " + SETTING_MQTT_SERVER + "," + SETTING_MQTT_USER);

  if (!WIFI_SSID.equals("")) {
    ssid = WIFI_SSID.c_str();
  }
  if (!WIFI_SECRET.equals("")) {
    password = WIFI_SECRET.c_str();
  }

// If the following 9 lines is commented out it works
   if (!SETTING_MQTT_SERVER.equals("")) {
      mqtt_server = SETTING_MQTT_SERVER.c_str();
   }
   if (!SETTING_MQTT_USER.equals("")) {
    mqtt_username = SETTING_MQTT_USER.c_str();
   }
   if (!SETTING_MQTT_PASSWORD.equals("")) {
     mqtt_password = SETTING_MQTT_PASSWORD.c_str();
   }
  Serial.println("Settings:mqtt_server:" + String(mqtt_server)+",mqtt_username:" + String(mqtt_username));
  Serial.print("\nConnecting to ");
  Serial.println(ssid);

  WiFi.mode(WIFI_STA);
  WiFi.begin(ssid, password);

  while (WiFi.status() != WL_CONNECTED) {
    delay(500);
    Serial.print(".");
  }
  randomSeed(micros());
  Serial.println("\nWiFi connected\nIP address: ");
  Serial.println(WiFi.localIP());

  while (!Serial) delay(1);

  espClient.setCACert(root_ca);
  client.setServer(mqtt_server, mqtt_port);
  client.setCallback(callback);
}

void loop() {
  if (!client.connected()) reconnect();

  client.loop();
  StaticJsonDocument<200> doc;
  doc["sensor"] = "gps";
  doc["time"] = 1351824120;
  doc["data"] = "gps";

  String topic = String("myhome/") + String(location) + String("/") + String(device_name);
  publishMessage(topic.c_str(), doc, true);
  delay(2000);
}

//=======================================================================Function=================================================================================

void reconnect() {
  // Loop until we’re reconnected
  while (!client.connected()) {
    Serial.print("Attempting MQTT connection…");
    String clientId = "ESP8266Client-";  // Create a random client ID
    clientId += String(random(0xffff), HEX);
    // Attempt to connect
    if (client.connect(clientId.c_str(), mqtt_username, mqtt_password)) {
      Serial.println("connected");
      //Subscribe to both location and device_type
      String location_str = String("myhome/" + String(location));
      client.subscribe(location_str.c_str());
      location_str += "/" + String(device_name);
      client.subscribe(location_str.c_str());
      String device = "device/" + String(device_type);
      client.subscribe(device.c_str());
      device += "/" + String(device_name);

      client.subscribe(device.c_str());
    } else {
      Serial.print("failed, rc=");
      Serial.print(client.state());
      Serial.println(" try again in 5 seconds");  // Wait 5 seconds before retrying
      delay(5000);
    }
  }
}

//=======================================
// This void is called every time we have a message from the broker

void callback(char* topic, byte* payload, unsigned int length) {
  Serial.println("callback");

  JsonDocument doc;
  DeserializationError error = deserializeJson(doc, payload);
  String output;
  serializeJson(doc, output);
  Serial.println("Message arrived [" + String(topic) + "]" + output);
}

//======================================= publising as string
void publishMessage(const char* topic, JsonDocument payload, boolean retained) {

  char buffer[256];
  size_t n = serializeJson(payload, buffer);
  client.publish(topic, buffer, retained);
}

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