Spencer Pratt emerged as one of the most notorious villains in reality TV history on MTV’s “The Hills” in the early 2000s. Now he’s using the same dramatic strategy in the Los Angeles mayoral race.
Brody Jenner appears at Mayor Pratt’s watch party
Brody Jenner was joined by his former “The Hills” co-star, Los Angeles mayoral candidate Spencer Pratt.
Before last January, Spencer Pratt was best known as the early 2000s instigator of the girl-next-door show on MTV’s hit reality show “The Hills.”
He rose to superstardom after teaming up with his current wife, Heidi Montag, to embarrass Montag’s former best friend, Lauren Conrad. (Conrad later became a very private designer for Kohl’s and a mother of two.)
In a 2018 retrospective video, MTV highlighted Pratt’s top six “Hills” meltdown moments, all of which involved confrontations with women.
One year after the Palisades wildfires,s Mr. Pratt, 42, who vandalized Southern California and destroyed homes, has announced his candidacy for mayor of Los Angeles.
Twenty years after “The Hills” premiered in 2006, Pratt had finished second to incumbent Karen Bass in the city’s Jungle primary by the afternoon of June 3. He has so far received about the same number of votes as businessman Rick Caruso, who won about 36% in the 2022 runoff against Bass, but ultimately lost by nearly 10 points.
Armed with a decades-long strategy for attracting attention, Pratt has emerged as the leading candidate to unseat Bass, the former congressman who came under fire over his response to the Los Angeles fires. She was traveling abroad to Ghana when a dangerous fire broke out.
And it seems like it was a real-life experience that made him a conservative firebrand. He accused city leadership of incompetence in addressing rising costs, drug use and homelessness rates. Politico journalist Alex Burns suggested that Pratt may be President Donald Trump’s heir apparent. Pratt boasts support from former co-stars Kristin Cavallari and Brody Jenner, but notably not from his former reality TV adversary Conrad. The coming months will tell whether he can make his hopes as mayor a reality.
USA TODAY repeatedly contacted the Pratt campaign requesting an interview. Pratt’s team has not yet made him available for an interview.
infamous reality show villain
One of the most notable reality TV shows in history, “The Hills” was the successor to MTV’s “Laguna Beach.” Earlier this year, Conrad, Cavallari and their alumni starred alongside their Laguna Beach High School cast and classmates in a lively 20-year reunion special set in the seaside enclave of Orange County.
After leaving school, Conrad and Cavallari starred in The Hills, starring Pratt. The spinoff follows the lives of the provocateur, his current spouse Montag, Caitlyn Jenner’s youngest son, and other twenty-somethings who aspire to Hollywood A-list fame, as well as each other.
The pair, who along with their spouses are known as “Speddy,” made tabloid headlines for their outlandish personal choices. In 2010, at the age of 23, Montag appeared on the cover of People magazine, revealing that he had 10 plastic surgeries in one day.
In 2010, Pratt’s departure from The Hills was surrounded by controversy. He appeared on other reality shows such as “Celebrity Big Brother” and “Marriage Boot Camp,” but failed to garner the same level of public attention as his former co-stars.
Conrad is the most famous of them, and Cavallari, who married and divorced NFL quarterback Jay Cutler, launched a successful jewelry line and starred on E! A show about her life in Nashville. Pratt and Montag directed “New Beginnings,” MTV’s short-lived “The Hills” reboot, which followed the couple, Jenner and other lesser-known stars. However, they never regained the dramatic pop culture status they had in their early 20s.
Will reality TV’s King of Shock be able to surprise Karen Bass?
And then the Palisades fire happened.
“In one January 2025 Instagram post, Pratt was planted in front of the couple’s dilapidated home wearing a T-shirt with the cover of Montag’s 2009 single ‘Body Language’ emblazoned on the front. ‘Stream @heidimontag’s music on any platform, it makes a huge difference!’ Thank you,” he wrote, using Montag’s 2010 single ‘Look How I’m Doin.’
Montag’s 2009 song and 2010 album “Superficial” hit No. 1 on iTunes 15 years after its release. After announcing his candidacy for mayor on January 7, Mr. Pratt immediately lashed out at Mr. Bass, calling him his “worst nightmare.” The shock factor he brought from his 20 years of reality TV ruffled feathers and sparked a national response. Trump himself is also participating in the campaign. “I heard he’s a big MAGA figure,” President Trump said at a press conference. “He’s fine.”
Shortly after announcing his mayoral campaign, Pratt began promoting his personal memoir, “The Man You Hated: Confessions from a Reality TV Villain,” which was released on January 27. Like Trump, he has tapped into popular culture to enhance his campaign. He is reportedly filming a behind-the-scenes show about racing against buses.
In late April, an ad titled “THEY NOT LIKE US,” after Compton rapper Kendrick Lamar’s Grammy-winning song, ran for genre rival Drake and took issue with Bass and Nisya Raman’s home.
In the ad, Pratt claims to live in an Airstream trailer, but after the outlet reported that he lives in the luxurious Hotel Bel Air, he told TMZ, “I’ve never told anyone that I live there.”
Mr. Pratt delighted Republicans during a raucous mayoral debate in early May (he called Mr. Bass an “incredible liar”).
During an appearance on Fox News’ “Gutfeld” last month, he said he hates the current mayor. “These people burned down my house and my mother’s house,” Pratt said.
On the night of the primary, the mayoral candidate posed hand in hand with Montag in a glossy paparazzi-style photo. “LA is coming back,” he captioned the photo.
Contributor: Taijuan Moorman
