Spencer Pratt’s viral feud with an ABC 7 reporter over how to handle Los Angeles’ homeless crisis has turned into a high-stakes test of his political message—just as prediction markets give him an 81% chance of facing Mayor Karen Bass in the race for the city’
Los Angeles mayoral candidate Spencer Pratt didn’t just disagree with an ABC 7 reporter on the city’s homeless crisis—he turned the interview into an argument about drugs, blame, and where he says the problem should be sent.
The exchange, prompted in an interview with ABC 7 reporter Josh Haskell on May 22, went viral over the weekend, then surged again online with one clip reaching 31 million views by Tuesday morning. It began when Haskell pressed Pratt on what he would do for “over 40,000 homeless in Los Angeles.”
Pratt’s answer quickly shifted the framing. He said the people on the streets were not “homeless. ” but “drug addicts. ” arguing “most of these people are addicted to fentanyl and meth.” He started to add. “This isn’t Spencer making it up. ” before Haskell interrupted with a direct question: “Are you saying they don’t have homes?”.
Pratt insisted Los Angeles already has places for people to sleep. “There is places for all of these people to sleep in LA,” he said. “No matter what anybody tells you, we have housing and shelter for everyone living on the street.”
Then he made his core claim—one that drew immediate tension with the way Haskell kept trying to pin down a concrete plan. Pratt said people were choosing to remain on the street because they wanted to “do drugs. ” didn’t want “rules. ” and wanted to “have animals to abuse.” In his telling. the idea that people are being forced into homelessness “is a lie that our city is perpetuating.”.
The debate sharpened as Pratt accused the Bass administration of paying for homelessness without addressing addiction. He called out Mayor Karen Bass for “just throwing tax money at the problem. but not doing anything to address the drugs.” He said the city has spent $24 billion to house the homeless. but argued most would rather stay outside and “torture” animals and do drugs.
When Haskell brought up Pratt’s plan to build treatment facilities and noted it would take “time to build the facility,” Pratt scoffed. He responded that it would take “just days to do it.”
Pratt also raised a separate line of blame aimed at nonprofit groups. He said Los Angeles has been taken advantage of by “scam NGOs” and “scam homeless nonprofits” that he claimed “bus homeless people into the city.” “These are products to a lot of people,” he said.
As the interview kept pushing toward what his approach would look like, Pratt ended up drawing a geopolitical-style contrast: he said that if he becomes mayor, “they can all go to Seattle,” where democratic socialist Mayor Katie Wilson “will welcome them.”
By Tuesday morning, the clip’s spread on X underscored how quickly the fight over homelessness could become a contest over messaging—what Pratt is promising, what he’s disputing, and what he’s willing to say on camera.
The interview arrives as Pratt’s mayoral prospects appear to be rising. The LA contest will narrow to a top two—LA will vote on the top two candidates. Prediction market Kalshi gives Pratt an 81% chance of advancing to face Bass in the election, even though Bass is still the heavy favorite to win.
Spencer Pratt Josh Haskell ABC 7 Karen Bass Katie Wilson Los Angeles mayoral race homelessness fentanyl meth Kalshi prediction market Seattle treatment facilities nonprofit scams