As an avid watcher of “The Hills” in the mid-aughts, I think Pratt is a particularly ill-suited entrant in the Los Angeles mayoral primary, which is a nonpartisan election. He was the dark prince of “The Hills,” spreading vile rumors about castmates. Pratt and his wife and “Hills” co-star, Heidi Montag, blew through $10 million and at one point had to move into a house his parents owned. In a memoir published this year, he explained that he spent $500,000 on Birkin bags for Montag and over $1 million on crystals. So he’s not a person I would trust on the fiscal management — to name just one responsibility — of a major American city struggling to balance its budget.
I watched last week’s Los Angeles mayoral debate with full knowledge of Pratt’s history. I have to admit that he dominated that performance. I’m not alone in that impression: As of Tuesday afternoon, 90 percent of participants in an online poll on NBC Los Angeles’s website said he won the debate.
Pratt, a registered Republican, has said that he is running for office because he and his parents lost their homes in the horrific Palisades fire in January 2025 and the incumbent, Mayor Karen Bass, a registered Democrat, did not have compelling explanations for her mishandling of the disaster. (She was out of the country when the fire started.) After the fire, her standing with Angelenos fell and never recovered. “I blame this person for burning my house and my parents’ house and my town and all my neighbors’ down. I am not working with Mayor Bass,” Pratt said.
During the debate, the moderator asked about the homelessness crisis, “Do you support the ordinance that restricts encampments in front of schools or day care centers?” and requested that the candidates answer with a straightforward “yes or no.” The City Council member Nithya Raman, a registered Democrat and a member of the Democratic Socialists of America, responded with “I, you know, I, I, support keeping our streets safe. I did vote against the structure of this particular ordinance, and it is because at its best — —” before being interrupted by the moderator.
The main reason Pratt was effective in the debate — and, it seems, more broadly in his campaign of late — is that he is channeling the anger that some Los Angeles residents feel about the state of their city. “I talk to thousands of moms a week. They do not feel safe in the street, no matter what these crime statistics are telling anybody,” he said. He ranted about fentanyl, supermeth and people being stabbed on the street. If you believe that crime is out of hand, hearing someone express that vehemently and authentically is far more compelling than Raman’s careful answers about establishing a Bureau of Homelessness Oversight.
