Rodeos are causing a circus at City Hall.
On Tuesday, rodeo lovers and animal welfare advocates descended on downtown Los Angeles to argue for and against a draft ordinancethat would ban the hooved spectacles within the city.
The thing is — the ordinance wasn’t even on the agenda.
In 2023, the city council voted unanimously to support the drafting of a ban by the city attorney.
But Councilmember Ysabel Jurado, the chair of the Arts, Parks, Libraries, and Community Enrichment Committee — which oversees rodeos — has yet to introduce the ordinance. The proposed rule, which was drafted in 2024, will expire at the end of the month if not brought to the City Council for a vote.
“Because this item was introduced before Councilmember Jurado took office, our office has taken a thorough and deliberate approach to reviewing the proposal and meeting with community stakeholders to fully understand its history, cultural context, and potential impacts,” said Alejandra Alarcon, a spokeswoman for Jurado. “We do not have a confirmed meeting date for this item at this time.”
The law defines rodeos as spectator events that include bareback and saddle bronc riding, bull riding, calf roping, steer wrestling, team roping, or any other event or activity that involves physically taking down an animal, roping an animal, or attempting to ride a bucking animal.
The ordinance included language that excludes equestrian events, as well as American Indian, Native American, Indigenous Rodeo, Mexican Charreria and Escaramuza events that don’t involve the activities cited in the law. For example, trick roping performed by horse riders that don’t actually lasso animals or choreographed riding to music are not included in the ban.
A new motion, introduced by Councilmember Bob Blumenfeld, who represents the west San Fernando Valley, would also direct the city attorney to apply the ban only to events that exceed 1,000 spectators.
At an arts and parks subcommittee meeting Tuesday morning, some members of the public urged Jurado to act and introduce the ordinance for a vote, while others encouraged her to drop it.
“Obviously, there are improvements that can be made, and there are definitely collateral damages” said a man who identified himself as Carlos Madriz. “We’re here to show you that we are also people that take care of our of animals, and we care for their well-being, and we do it with dignity.”
Others urged Jurado to introduce the ordinance for a vote and ban the practice.
“Torturing animals in rodeos is not a celebration of Latino culture, that is an insult,” said former KCAL reporter, Jane Velez-Mitchell. “Almost half of the population of Los Angeles is Latino. 1.8 million people. How many of them do you see riding around on bulls and wearing cowboy hats and sombreros? This is cynical political theater. I dare say most of the sombreros in Los Angeles are in this room right now.”
She also mentioned news reports showing that U.S. Customs and Border Patrol uses rodeo events to recruit agents.
In 2008, Border Patrol began sponsoring the Professional Bull Riders (PBR), the largest competitive bull-riding league in the world.
During President Trump’s first term, the administration signed a $1.5-million deal with the organization. Later, in 2019, the administration allotted $3 million annually for five years. Photos from PBR eventsshow bullfighters wearing shirts with “Protected by U.S. Border Patrol” emblazoned on their backs.
“Why would Los Angeles provide a venue and a platform for ICE to do its dirty work? ICE out, rodeos out, pass this out of committee. Let the people of Los Angeles have a cruelty-free city,” Velez-Mitchell said. U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement and the Border Patrol are overseen by the Department of Homeland Security, but they are separate agencies. ICE does not sponsor PBR events or recruit agents at those events.
Demonstrators on both sides of the issue also showed up at a full council meeting Tuesday. People wearing cowboy hats and sombreros peppered the audience chamber. Again, rodeo supporters and opponents lined up at the microphone to speak.
Councilmember Monica Rodriguez addressed concerns about ICE at the end of the meeting. She held up a flier that had been sent to people in her district that claimed ICE was going to rodeo events to target immigrants.
She said it was infuriating that those opposed to rodeos would try to incite fear.
“It’s exploitative and frankly disrespectful and infuriating that that is kind of a last-ditch effort to suggest to my community … that they’ve been wrong the whole time,” she said. “I look forward to having a robust and honest conversation about how we actually protect what is culturally very dear to members of my community.”
Samuel Brown Vazquez, a vaquero and community organizer attending the meeting, said he remembered when City Council members first discussed the rodeo ban in 2023.
At the time, he said, he was under the impression that the community would be consulted if it came up again. But that didn’t happen, he said, so on Tuesday, he and a dozen other members of the charro community came out to speak against the ban.
“This is low-hanging fruit and that’s why they went after us,” he said. “If this moves forward, this is the end of our ability to continue to practice.”
Matt Rossell, a member of the Animal Legal Defense Fund, an animal welfare group, took the microphone and mentioned a recent incident at the Orange County Fair when a bucking bull suffered a fatal injury. He said the accident wasn’t reported to the state, as is required by law.
California requires that a veterinarian to be present or nearby and on call. Injury reports must be sent to the state’s Veterinary Medical Board.
Other jurisdictions throughout the state and nation have put limits on or banned rodeos, including San Francisco, Irvine and Pasadena, as well as Pittsburgh; Baltimore County, Md.; Leesburg, Va.; and Fort Wayne, Ind.
A 2022 Times reviewof those reports showed that since 2001, when the veterinarian law went into effect, more than 125 animal injuries were reported. The reports were written by attending or on-call veterinarians and submitted to the California Veterinary Medical Board.
The reports documented injuries including superficial abrasions suffered as panicked animals rushed out of their chutes, as well as crushed skulls, broken legs, gored flanks and snapped spines.
Experts, activists and records prepared by veterinarians at events say these numbers probably are conservative and underrepresent the extent of injuries that happen at rodeos.
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