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“A reality show star comes out of nowhere to enter politics and win a race almost no one expected him to win.”
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This narrative, of course, could apply to Donald Trump‘s improbable victory in the 2016 presidential election. Trump had never run for public office before. One debate moderator, John Harwood, with CNBC at the time, called his race a “cartoon candidacy” as Trump was onstage as the clear front-runner. Democratic strategist James Carville said the Republican Party was “driving off a cliff” in nominating Trump and was “committing suicide” in the long term in doing so. And on the morning of the election, the New York Times gave Democrat Hillary Clinton a 73% chance of winning.
We’ve seen those from the entertainment business make the jump to the political arena before, most famously by President Ronald Reagan, a two-term governor of California before pursuing the highest office in the land. Arnold Schwarzenegger also served eight years as California governor earlier this century. Actor and director Clint Eastwood was an effective mayor of Carmel, California. And Sonny Bono was mayor of Palm Springs, California, before becoming a congressman. There are other examples from Fred Thompson to Al Franken, but you get the point.
Politics, especially in the social media era, is seemingly just as much about performance and presentation as it is policy. Zohran Mamdani, New York’s socialist mayor, is a prime example. He had zero executive experience before running, but a highly effective, and cheap-to-produce, online campaign propelled him to an easy victory over former Gov. Andrew Cuomo and the seemingly perpetual Republican candidate Curtis Sliwa.
Trump also used social media, especially the platform now known as X, in reaching low-propensity voters that political ads on TV were not reaching in the cord-cutting era. Clinton may have out-raised Trump 2-to-1 during that cycle, but social media became the great equalizer on the messaging front.
Which brings us to former reality star Spencer Pratt’s campaign for mayor of Los Angeles. Pratt, a registered Republican, also has no prior political experience. But in a world where voters increasingly are willing to ignore and even embrace it, having no experience may be a net plus. This is especially true for Pratt, who is already proving to be an outstanding public debater and speaker, both during interviews, live events, and campaign videos.
On Wednesday night, Pratt and Mayor Karen Bass, along with City Councilmember Nithya Raman, met for a debate ahead of the June 2 primary. Under California rules, the top two candidates will meet in the general election in November. And while Pratt was a decided underdog to finish first or second in June, he’s now gaining with gale force winds at his back following what was a dominant and masterful performance on that debate stage.
How dominant? An NBC-4 Los Angeles online poll shows 87% of those responding believe Pratt won, while just 8% said Bass won, and 5% going to Raman.
“With polls showing large shares of undecided voters, Pratt’s strong showing could alter the dynamics of the June 2 primary,” according to the Los Angeles Times. “Pre-debate surveys placed Bass in the lead, but Pratt’s media savvy, viral campaign ads, and outsider appeal have drawn attention. Analysts note that while online polls are not scientific, his performance may boost fundraising and visibility, especially among voters seeking a break from City Hall’s status quo.”
Winning is absolutely possible for Pratt if he can finish first or second in the primary to get to the general. Bass is sitting at 25% approval in one of the bluest cities in the country, according to a recent University of California, Los Angeles, poll. Her handling of the wildfires, after leaving the state in January 2025 for a trip to Ghana despite ample warning for the possibility of massive wildfires due to forecasted high Santa Ana winds, has proven to be almost impossible to recover from. Almost none of the 17,000 homes destroyed in Los Angeles County have been rebuilt more than 17 months later. Homelessness is still rampant in LA, as is drug use. Taxes remain among the highest in the country. Unemployment is the highest in the United States, as are gas prices.
Pratt’s momentum took off after he released an online video of himself standing in front of a trailer home he’s been forced to live in since the wildfires burned down his home. The video proceeds to show the opulent homes of his opponents.
“This is where Mayor Bass lives. Do you notice something? Or here, where Nithya Raman’s $3 million mansion sits,” Pratt said in the ad. “They don’t have to live in the mess they’ve created.”
On X, the ad has been viewed more than 13 million times on Pratt’s official account alone, with tens of thousands of reposts spreading it all over the internet.
But the question is: Are there enough Republicans and independents left in Los Angeles to put a non-Democrat over the finish line in a general election? Bass won by nearly 10 points in 2022 over Rick Caruso, who was a Republican before becoming a Democrat before the 2022 election in an attempt to avoid being labeled. History is also not on Pratt’s side, with the last Republican being elected Los Angeles mayor, Richard Riordan, coming in 1993. Pratt, however, believes the majority of his votes will come from Democrats, and he’s putting the choice as a binary one between common sense and socialist chaos.
“It’s just the socialists and the communists that don’t back me,” Pratt said recently. “But no, I’m confident I’m probably going to win with 51% on June 2 because I don’t do a political message.
“I don’t do national politics. I don’t do tribal politics. I don’t talk about other states. I’m localized. I just want to fix our streets, get the lights on. I want people to feel safe. I want to get our tax money to not be robbed by these literal criminal [nongovernmental organizations] stealing from our tax to increase the homelessness.”
According to U.S. News and World Report’s annual state rankings, California clocks in at 38th-worst in crime, 32nd-worst on the economy, 42nd-worst on fiscal stability, 35th on infrastructure, and 24th on education. Only healthcare ranks highly. And per a MortgagePoint study, the city has one of the largest population declines in the U.S., losing more than 300,000 residents between 2020 and 2026. For a city with a good climate and coastline, that’s an incredible number. Reasons cited include high housing costs, crime concerns, high cost of living, and weakening job markets.
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Maybe the tide is notably turning in blue states when solid candidates are offered, which didn’t happen in New York against Mamdani. People are either leaving for red states or quickly realizing that leaders such as Bass are only making their lives more expensive and dangerous.
Republican Steve Hilton is leading all candidates in the race for California governor. Pratt is coming on like a freight train in Los Angeles. Accountability may finally be coming in the Golden State — a place where a few celebrities have come out of nowhere before to capture the hearts and minds of a public desperately yearning for basic common sense and competency.
