The lunar calendar may say it\u2019s the Year of the Horse, but for Los Angeles politics it\u2019s been more like the Year of the Dog.<\/p>\n
Spencer Pratt made animal welfare a key platform in his unsuccessful campaign for mayor, taking out billboard space around town showing himself surrounded by dogs and railing against animal abuse in social media posts<\/a>. But Pratt wasn\u2019t the only one seeking to win the votes of animal rights activists.<\/p>\n City Councilmember Nithya Raman, who will be in the Nov. 3 runoff against Mayor Karen Bass, is promising to fix L.A.\u2019s animal shelter system, which she said is in state of crisis, blaming a \u201cbroken spay\/neuter program\u201d<\/a> among other factors. Dylan Kendall, a longtime cat rescuer and advocate, made her background in animal welfare<\/a> a centerpiece in her unsuccessful bid against Councilmember Hugo Soto-Mart\u00ednez. <\/p>\n Deputy Dist. Atty. John McKinney published a 10-step plan<\/a> to support animal welfare as part of his campaign for city attorney.<\/p>\n \u201cPoliticians are understanding that this is a significant group of people who can move the needle in races, especially close races,\u201d McKinney said. He finished in second place in the primary and will be in the runoff against Marissa Roy, a democratic socialist who works as a deputy state attorney general.<\/p>\n No candidate, however, focused more on animal rights than Pratt during the recent primary campaign. <\/p>\n \u201cI don\u2019t want anybody to endorse me except for the moms and animal lovers in L.A. That\u2019s my entire vote,\u201d Pratt said the weekend before the primary on the Fox News comedy show \u201cGutfeld!\u201d<\/p>\n In a nearly 10-minute long video<\/a>, Pratt repeated social media posts that dogs on Skid Row are used to test drugs, are bred for drug money and are left in poor conditions by their unhoused owners, among other concerns about overcrowded, dirty shelters across the city.<\/p>\n Social media descriptions of Skid Row dogs being used for fights and to test drugs often lack credible evidence and actionable information, said Los Angeles Police Department Lt. Andrew Mathes, officer-in-charge of the Central Gang Impact Team that works in the Skid Row area. <\/p>\n Paul Koretz, who championed animal rights during his years on the City Council, said Pratt\u2019s claims were a \u201cdramatic fabrication\u201d of the actual problems on Skid Row, aimed at winning votes. He and others say the bigger problem is illegal breeding<\/a>, leading to underfed and neglected animals that end up in shelters or dead on the streets. <\/p>\n Even so, some animal rights activists credit viral social media posts depicting animal abuse as focusing public attention on the issue. <\/p>\n \u201cWhen they finally go viral online, that\u2019s when the public wants to get involved. That\u2019s when political candidates can definitely get involved,\u201d said Liv Sigel, founder of the Underdog Community Project.<\/p>\n Other activists have directed much of the ire at Mayor Karen Bass for the city\u2019s animal abuse problems, saying chronic underfunding of the Animal Services department, including the spay and neuter fund, will lead to more sickly and abandoned animals entering the system. <\/p>\n The nonprofit Stand Up For Pits sued the city and Bass last year, arguing in a May 2026 amended complaint from that officials have failed to enforce animal abuse laws on city streets and allow shelter pets to live in deplorable conditions.<\/p>\n Bass campaign spokesperson Alex Stack noted that she helped launch spay-and-neuter clinic pop-ups for Skid Row and started an initiative to train 100 LAPD officers to identify and handle cases of animal cruelty. The LAPD\u2019s Mathes said that initiative, launched last November, has saved 45 dogs and led to the filing of six felony cases of animal cruelty and neglect.<\/p>\n \u201cSocial media makes it much easier to spread outrage and then to offer real solutions to real problems,\u201d Stack said in a statement. \u201cAnimal neglect and abuse on Skid Row is a real, longstanding issue, but we have to make sure we are offering real solutions to the most pressing problems,\u201d <\/p>\n Bass pledged that L.A. shelters would be \u201ca national model for animal welfare\u201d after taking office in 2022. She hired a new general manager, Staycee Dains, but Dains lasted only a year in the job. She told The Times that insurmountable red tape <\/a>blocked her from making changes. <\/p>\n