‘First feline’ Larry marks 15 years as Britain’s political top cat

LONDON (AP) — In turbulent political times, stability comes with four legs, whiskers and a fondness for napping.

Larry the cat celebrates 15 years on Sunday as the British government’s official rodent-catcher and unofficial first feline, a reassuring presence who has served under six prime ministers. Sometimes it seems like they have served under him.

“Larry the cat’s approval ratings will be very high,” said Philip Howell, a Cambridge University professor who has studied the history of human-animal relations. “And prime ministers tend not to hit those numbers.

"He represents stability, and that’s at a premium."

The gray-and-white tabby’s rags-to-riches story has taken him from stray on the streets to Britain’s seat of power, 10 Downing St., where he bears the official title Chief Mouser to the Cabinet Office.

Adopted from London’s Battersea Dogs and Cats Home by then-Prime Minister David Cameron, Larry entered Downing Street on Feb. 15, 2011. According to a profile on the U.K. government website, his duties include “greeting guests to the house, inspecting security defenses and testing antique furniture for napping quality.”

Larry roams freely and has a knack for upstaging world leaders arriving at 10 Downing St.’s famous black door, to the delight of news photographers.

“He’s great at photo-bombing,” said Justin Ng, a freelance photographer who has come to know Larry well over the years. “If there’s a foreign leader that’s about to visit then we know he’ll just come out at the exact moment that meet-and-greet is about to happen.”

Larry has met many world leaders, who sometimes have to step around or over him. It has been observed that he is largely unfriendly to men, though he took a liking to former U.S. President Barack Obama, and he drew a smile from President Volodymyr Zelenskyy on one of the Ukrainian leader’s visits to London.

When U.S. President Donald Trump visited in 2019, Larry crashed the official doorstep photo and then took a nap under the Beast, the president’s armored car.

Reports of Larry’s rodent-catching skills vary, though he has been photographed snagging the occasional mouse — and, once, a pigeon, which escaped.

“He’s more of a lover than a fighter,” Ng said. “He’s very good at what he does: lounging around and basically showing people that he’s very nonchalant.”

Larry has cohabited, sometimes uneasily, with prime ministerial pets including Boris Johnson’s Jack Russell cross Dilyn and Rishi Sunak’s Labrador retriever Nova. He is kept well away from current Prime Minister Keir Starmer’s family cats, JoJo and Prince, who inhabit the private family quarters while Larry rules the working areas of Downing Street.

He had a volatile relationship with Palmerston, diplomatic top cat at the Foreign Office across the street from No. 10. The pair were caught tussling several times before Palmerston retired in 2020. Palmerston died this month in Bermuda, where he was serving as “feline relations consultant” to the governor.

Meanwhile, Larry abides. He is 18 or 19, and has slowed down a bit, but continues to patrol his turf and to sleep on a window ledge above a radiator just inside the No. 10 door.

He is British soft power in feline form, and woe betide any prime minister who got rid of him.

“A cat-hating PM, that seems to me to be political suicide,” said Howell.

He said Larry’s status as nonpartisan “official pet” sets him apart from the American presidential pets – most often dogs – that U.S. leaders have sometimes deployed to soften their image.

“The fact that cats are less tractable is part of the charm, too,” Howell said. “He’s sort of whimsically not partisan in a political sense, but he tends to take to some people and not to others and he won’t necessarily sit where you want him to sit and pose where you want him to pose.

“There is a certain kind of unruliness about Larry which I think would endear him, certainly, to Brits.”

Associated Press video journalist Kwiyeon Ha contributed to this story.

Britain's Prime Minister Keir Starmer welcomes Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy to 10 Downing Street as Larry the cat, Chief Mouser to the Cabinet Office, steps out in London, Thursday, Oct. 10, 2024. (AP Photo/Alastair Grant, File)

Larry the Cat, Britain's Chief Mouser to the Cabinet Office, sits in front the flower decoration outside 10 Downing street in the national Ukrainian colours, on Ukraine Independence Day in London, Wednesday, Aug. 24, 2022. (AP Photo/Frank Augstein, File)

Britain's Prime Minister Theresa May and her husband Philip greet President Donald Trump and first lady Melania outside 10 Downing Street in central London, Tuesday, June 4, 2019. (AP Photo/Kirsty Wigglesworth, File)

Larry the cat, Chief Mouser to the Cabinet Office, is watched by journalists at 10 Downing Street in London, Friday, Feb. 13, 2026.(AP Photo/Alastair Grant)

Larry, the official 10 Downing Street cat walks outside 10 Downing Street before the nationwide Clap for Carers to recognise and support National Health Service (NHS) workers and carers fighting the coronavirus pandemic, in London, Thursday, May 21, 2020. (AP Photo/Frank Augstein, File)

CORTINA D'AMPEZZO, Italy (AP) — American Lindsey Vonn was preparing to fly back to her home country on Sunday after her terrifying head-over-heels crash in the Olympic downhill, the U.S. Ski Team's chief told The Associated Press.

Sophie Goldschmidt, president and CEO of the U.S. Ski and Snowboard Association, said the team’s medical staff has been coordinating Vonn’s recovery since the crash and subsequent helicopter evacuation at the Milan Cortina Games and would try to accompany her home. Vonn has had multiple surgeries in Italy to repair a complex tibia fracture in her left leg.

“We’re working through all of that at the moment,” Goldschmidt said. “We’ve got a great team around helping her and she’ll go back to the U.S. for further surgeries.”

Spectators tuning in to see Vonn attempt to win a medal at age 41 with a torn ACL in her left knee and a partial titanium replacement in her right knee were stunned when she clipped a gate 13 seconds into her run, resulting in a spinning, airborne crash that sent her careening down the Dolomite mountain.

“The impact, the silence, everyone was just in shock. And you could tell it was a really nasty injury,” said Goldschmidt, who was there. “There’s a lot of danger in doing all sorts of Alpine sports but it gives more of an appreciation for how superhuman these athletes are.

“I mean, putting your body on the line, going at those speeds, the physicality. Sometimes actually on the broadcast it’s really hard to get that across,” Goldschmidt added. “Danger sometimes brings fans in and is pretty captivating. We obviously hope we won’t have injuries like that but it is unfortunately part and parcel of our sports.”

Vonn herself said she has no regrets.

“When I think back on my crash, I didn’t stand in the starting gate unaware of the potential consequences,” Vonn said in an Instagram post late Saturday. “I knew what I was doing. I chose to take a risk. Every skier in that starting gate took the same risk. Because even if you are the strongest person in the world, the mountain always holds the cards.

“But just because I was ready, that didn’t guarantee me anything. Nothing in life is guaranteed. That’s the gamble of chasing your dreams, you might fall but if you don’t try you’ll never know,” Vonn added.

Goldschmidt visited Vonn at the hospital twice and said, “She’s not in pain. She’s in a stable condition.

“She took an aggressive line and was all in and it was inches off what could have ended up a very different way,” Goldschmidt said. “But what she’s done for our sports and the sport in general, her being a role model, has gone to a whole new level. You learn often more about people during these tough moments than when they’re winning.”

AP Winter Olympics: https://apnews.com/hub/milan-cortina-2026-winter-olympics

General view of Ca' Foncello Hospital in Treviso, Italy, Sunday, Feb. 8, 2026, where U.S. skier Lindsey Vonn is hospitalized with a broken leg after crashing during the women's downhill competition at the Milan-Cortina Olympics. (Paola Garbuio/LaPresse via AP)

United States' Lindsey Vonn is airlifted away after a crash during an alpine ski women's downhill race, at the 2026 Winter Olympics, in Cortina d'Ampezzo, Italy, Sunday, Feb. 8, 2026. (AP Photo/Jacquelyn Martin)

United States' Lindsey Vonn crashes during an alpine ski women's downhill race, at the 2026 Winter Olympics, in Cortina d'Ampezzo, Italy, Sunday, Feb. 8, 2026. (AP Photo/Jacquelyn Martin)