The ladies of The View are officially not buying the Spencer Pratt mayoral phenomenon — at least not yet.
During a heated segment this week, the ABC panel unloaded on Pratt’s increasingly high-profile campaign for mayor of Los Angeles, criticizing everything from his qualifications to the viral AI-generated videos helping fuel his online momentum.
The criticism comes as Pratt continues climbing in polling while incumbent Mayor Karen Bass faces intensifying scrutiny over homelessness, crime, and especially the fallout from January’s catastrophic wildfires that devastated parts of Los Angeles, including the Pacific Palisades where Pratt lost his own home.
LA is worth saving. Vote Spencer Pratt. pic.twitter.com/S9O8jvTz4I
— Charles Curran (@charliebcurran) May 11, 2026
According to a May Emerson poll, Bass currently leads the race with 30%, while Pratt has surged to 22%, edging ahead of left-wing Councilwoman Nithya Raman at 19%.
That momentum clearly has establishment media paying attention.
Moderator Whoopi Goldberg said she was deeply uncomfortable with the AI-generated campaign material associated with Pratt’s rise, arguing celebrity status alone should not qualify someone to run America’s second-largest city.
“If they know what they’re doing, I welcome anybody who knows how to do this,” Goldberg said. “But if you’re going to be like the guy who’s already in charge, thank you, no.”
Goldberg also warned against voters confusing fame with competence.
“Just because somebody is famous or is famous for something doesn’t mean they know what’s going on and how you are thinking and how you’re feeling,” she added.
Much of the controversy centers around a viral AI-generated video created by one of Pratt’s supporters — not by his official campaign — portraying Pratt as a Batman-style vigilante rescuing a dystopian Los Angeles from corrupt political leadership. In the video, Karen Bass is depicted as a Joker-like villain presiding over urban collapse.
The clip quickly exploded online, partly because it appeared to feature AI-generated celebrity likenesses, including actor Hugh Jackman, despite no public endorsement from those figures.
Co-host Sara Haines acknowledged she understood why Pratt entered politics after personally experiencing the wildfire disaster firsthand.
“What I liked about Spencer Pratt throwing his hat in there is he was affected by the California wildfires and he decided, ‘I’m going to do something about it,’” Haines said.
Still, she expressed concern about AI’s growing role in political campaigns.
“Our brains aren’t designed to say, ‘Oh, that’s not really Hugh Jackman saying these things,’” Haines warned.
Conservative panelist Alyssa Farah Griffin echoed those concerns while also acknowledging that voter frustration may be creating an opening for Pratt politically.
“I think there’s a path,” Griffin said, pointing to public dissatisfaction following the wildfire response.
But she warned that AI-driven political content risks misleading voters into believing endorsements or support exist where they do not.
“I think introducing A.I. into campaigns in general is super dangerous,” Griffin said. “It can be incredibly misleading.”
Griffin also emphasized that governing Los Angeles would require far more than viral internet popularity.
“Getting elected is the easy part of the job,” she said. “Governing three million people in Los Angeles — and fixing what is a broken system — is what’s hard.”
Goldberg quickly jumped back in.
“Yeah, you actually have to know what you’re doing.”
That became the central theme of the panel’s criticism.
Sunny Hostin focused heavily on the scale and complexity of running Los Angeles, which oversees nearly $15 billion in annual spending and remains under international scrutiny ahead of the FIFA World Cup and the 2028 Olympics.
LA is worth saving. Vote Spencer Pratt. pic.twitter.com/GpQpnfsuJe
— Charles Curran (@charliebcurran) May 5, 2026
“We’re talking about a $14.9 billion budget for the city,” Hostin said. “It’s the second largest city budget in the country, and he is not qualified for it.”
Hostin rejected comparisons Pratt has made between outsider candidates and figures like Barack Obama, noting Obama graduated from Harvard Law School and served in the Senate before becoming president.
“You don’t have the same experience,” Hostin said bluntly.
Joy Behar was even less charitable.
“So, Karen Bass has a JFK Profile in Courage Award,” Behar said. “She navigated California through the worst economic crisis since the Depression. Spencer Pratt was snapchatter of the year.”
That line drew laughter from the audience, though critics online pointed out Bass herself has faced relentless backlash over the city’s wildfire preparedness and broader governance problems.
Pratt entered the race after publicly accusing Bass and city leadership of catastrophic failures tied to the Palisades fires. Since then, he has built his campaign almost entirely around government incompetence, recovery failures, and what he portrays as a disconnected political establishment unwilling to address worsening quality-of-life issues across Los Angeles.
Bass herself responded to the AI controversy during a CNN interview, warning that demonizing political opponents can have dangerous consequences.
“When your messages are so hateful and when you demonize people, then you do provoke people who are unstable, and you can jeopardize people’s safety,” Bass said.
