⁍ The 55th Street mayoral race in Oakland started with an incumbent cat named Wally running unopposed.

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⁍ Other pets pounced at the opportunity to make the race competitive.

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⁍ The ballot will feature ranked voting, in which voters rank their preferred candidates.

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– The residents of 55th Street in Oakland, Calif., are electing a new mayor this weekend—and it’s not a cat. The incumbent cat, Wally, is running unopposed, Reuters reports. “We decided our cat Betty seemed mayoral and that maybe we needed a change on 55th Street and we thought we’d just jump right in,” says Kirstyn Russell, a 49-year-old photography teacher. Russell’s 10-year-old daughter, Maeve, is throwing her support behind Betty. “She’s really good and she wants to crush the patriarchy, and so that’s why I’m going to vote for her. And she’s awesome,” Maeve says. Mary Owen, a 57-year-old project manager, has an 11-year-old Shiba Inu named Mimi running with the slogan “She’ll bark when it matters.” “People are really responding to just how fun this is,” says Rachel Kadner, a 43-year-old school librarian who put a 6-year-old pit bull mix on the ballot with the slogan “Keep Oakland Ruff.”