At The Very Minimum, Spencer Pratt Has Become A National Figure

The latest polls are an illuminating vignette. There were a few polls in March that had incumbent Kasren Bass at abouit 25%, Mamdani clone Nithya Raman at between 9% and 17%, and Spencer Pratt trailing in the low double digits. There were no polls in April. All of a sudden, the pollsters got interested, and there were four polls in May; the big change is Pratt. Three of the polls put him at 22%, while one, McLaughlin, puts him at 30%, leading Bass by one point. All four put Bass in the mid-to-high 20s, while most have Pratt leading Raman, who is between 19% and 20%.

The big difference between March and May is Pratt's momentum. The hurdle he has to overcome in the primary tomorrow is that he must finish in the top two and keep Bass from getting over 50%, in which case she would be elected mayor withut going to the November general election. This is his only possible strategy, since he himself doesn't have any serious chance of making 51% himself, at least as of now. But he's doubled his March numbers and put the race into a margin-of-error tie. Polymarket betting odds right now give an 84% chance that Pratt and Bass advance to a runoff.

So far, Pratt has been able to define the big issue in the race, which is homeless encampments. Raman and Bass are seen as either tacitly favoring the homeless outright, or supporting them de facto due to their weaponized incompetence. This seems to have done the most damage to Raman, whose numbers have improved since March, but not as much as Pratt's. Raman was trolled by constituents independently of the Pratt campaign for her inaction:

Socialist LA mayoral candidate Nithya Raman is getting hammered online after appearing visibly rattled by a staged homeless encampment protest outside her own home.

“I’m glad my kids didn’t have to see that,” Raman told comedian [sic] Adam Conover on his podcast released Wednesday before adding, “I thought this campaign was going to be about bike lanes and transportation.”

Raman was referring to a staged Memorial Day protest outside Raman’s Silver Lake-area home.

Footage from the stunt shows homeless people climbing out of tents, staging an open-air barbecue and one individual walking around carrying a bucket as neighbors recorded the scene.

The podcast was quickly shared on online with comment exploding because Raman has spent years defending homeless encampments near schools, parks and neighborhoods across Los Angeles while opposing tougher enforcement restrictions.

Critics immediately accused the Democratic Socialist councilmember of showing a stunning lack of self-awareness as families across Los Angeles continue dealing with encampments outside homes, playgrounds and schools.

Yup, she was going to campaign on bike lanes and transportation. Pratt singlehandedly changed the issues in the campaign with the innovative ads he's run since March. Media has begun to find him an appealing figure; as the YouTube embedded above shows, he was on Gutfeld Friday night bantering about Jill Biden and Joe's debate performance. Bill Maher has given him a not-quite endorsement:

CNN's Harry Enten says Pratt has a shot at winning, and Mark Halperin, who's been a Pratt fan all along, agrees:

Peachy Keenan at The Spectator says, Get ready for a Spencer Pratt Summer: He can win. Mark Halperin's more recent take is at best outside the box:

Guys, I have a new theory of the race . . . we looked at the poll yesterday [May 30] that showed the three candidates all bunched up. . . . Here's my new prediction: Bass is not gonna make the runoff. And if it's Spencer Pratt against a socialist, he's gonna win.

His interlocutor replies,

But you remember, it's ironic this is happening in LA. You remember the Bradley effect? Remember about Mayor Tom Bradley?

Actually, his own memory is fuzzy. Tom Bradley was LA's first African-American mayor, in office from 1973 to 1993. He never lost a mayoral election, However, according to Wikipedia,

Bradley ran to be the first black Governor of any state since Reconstruction in 1982 and 1986 but was defeated both times by Republican candidate George Deukmejian. Bradley's narrow and unexpected 1982 loss was at odds with the polls and was attributed to the racist vote, giving rise to the political term "the Bradley effect".

Again, according to Wikipedia,

The Bradley effect, less commonly known as the Wilder effect, is a theory concerning observed discrepancies between voter opinion polls and election outcomes in some United States government elections where a white and a non-white candidate run against each other. The theory proposes that some white voters who intend to vote for the white candidate will nonetheless tell pollsters that they are undecided or likely to vote for the non-white candidate. It was named after Los Angeles Mayor Tom Bradley, an African-American who lost the 1982 California gubernatorial election to California attorney general George Deukmejian, an Armenian-American, despite Bradley's being ahead in voter polls going into the elections.

It might also be called the "truth-teller effect" if it applies to Donald Trump or, potentially, to Spencer Pratt. Trump won the 2016 presidential election in spite of the polls and also outperformed the polls in 2024 because he ran on uncomfortable truths regarding DEI and immigration. People are less likely to tell pollsters they support the "truthteller's" position on the uncomfortable truths.

I don't think Mark Halperin's prediction will turn out, but I do go along with Polymarket's prediction that the two top candidates in tomorrow's election will turn out to be Bass and Pratt. But if it turns out to be Pratt and Raman, Pratt's strategy will be the same: he'll campaign against drugs, homeless encampments, and his opponent's open or tacit support of both.

What Pratt has going for him is that he's natural and sincere in front of the camera, he has a quick wit, and he's telegenic, which got him on Gutfeld. His momentum since February has come from the combination of these qualities with the truthtelling on issues. It doesn't hurt at all that some very talented people have donated extremely effective ads to his campaign, and this is likely to continue. His performance in then one debatge before the primary suggests he'll do well if there's another, but Bass did so poorly in that same debate that she may try to avoid another.

But what if he's elected? Remember that only one City Council member, Traci Park, is aligned with Pratt's program; many of the other 14 are likely to oppose him bitterly. Pratt will need to use the attractive persona he's built to rally the public directly to have much chance in implementing his program.

But the past few weeks have begun to bring me around to the view that he at least has a chance of winning -- even if he loses, he's established himself as a national figure. What might he do then?

UPDATE: Bill Maher, "Just keep doin' what you're doin'."

💥NEW: Bill Maher to Spencer Pratt👏

“You had me at hello … You have the exact right impatience with this sh*t. It’s very authentic … It’s good. Just keep doing what you’re doing.” pic.twitter.com/CHo5oxK3rx

— Jason Cohen 🇺🇸 (@JasonJournoDC) June 1, 2026