Spencer Pratt claims L.A.'s homeless will move to Seattle if he's elected. That city's mayor responds
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Seattle Mayor Katie Wilson pushed back against a claim by Los Angeles mayoral candidate Spencer Pratt that if he’s elected, L.A.’s homeless population would move to Seattle to take advantage of that city’s drug laws.Pratt made the comment during an interview with ABC’s Josh Haskell, in which he claimed the city’s more than 40,000 homeless were choosing to live on the street.
“These people, when I unplug them ...they’re all going to Seattle where the mayor will welcome them,” Pratt told Haskell.
Pratt, a Republican, has made L.A.’s stubborn homeless crisis a key campaign topic, at times posting images of unhoused people on his social media accounts.He has often expressed disdain for L.A.’s homeless population.“They’re not homeless, they’re drug addicts,” Pratt said in the ABC interview in late May.
“They’re choosing to be on the street because they want to do drugs, they don’t want rules, they don’t want to listen, they want to have animals to abuse.This idea that they’re forced on the street right now is a lie.”But in an interview with Fox 13 Seattle’s Hana Kim Wednesday, Wilson pushed back, saying the homeless crisis facing major cities across the country was being fueled by housing costs, not drug abuse.
“What is driving homelessness is housing costs,” Wilson said when asked about Pratt’s comment.“There is a very, very clear correlation between housing costs and homelessness, and that does not mean that drugs are not a factor.
They absolutely are a factor.” California Los Angeles mayoral candidate Spencer Pratt wants to use arrests and mandatory drug and addiction treatment to clear the streets, but some expert said he would face huge legal, financial and practical hurdles in doing so.Wilson did not directly mention Pratt in her response but acknowledged briefly a cheer from an audience member during the Seattle CityClu...