Prickly City

Carmen – a 'feisty' conservative and a Republican. For a brief time, she had a crush on Tucker Carlson. Carmen made her first appearance at least 4 months before the strip began, in one of Stantis's editorial cartoons.^[3]

Winslow – named for the town of Winslow, Arizona, is a coyote with political aspirations who acts patronizing, condescending and impulsive. His liberal responses are typically the source of the strip's jokes. Carmen is continuously frustrated by Winslow's assumption that she should be a liberal feminist. Early in the strip's run, Winslow had a crush on Condoleezza Rice, even writing a poem about her (which Carmen initially misunderstood as being a poem about herself).

Minor recurring characters

• Kevin, the Lost Bunny of the Apocalypse. Depending on the needs of the strip, he's alternately meant to evoke Barack Obama and Bill Clinton. He reports on signs of the "end times". In 2010, he was elected to the U.S. Senate under the banner of Winslow's "Lefty Tea Party".
• Hunny, Kevin's wife (also a bunny) and a prominent politician. Her character is a thinly veiled satire of Hillary Clinton.
• Dio, a chameleon named for Diogenes the Cynic. He was a campaign director for Winslow.
• Vaughn, appears to be an armadillo. He served as Winslow's campaign finance director.
• Rand, a vulture, possibly named after Rand Paul or Ayn Rand.
• Skunk, a thinly veiled satire of Donald Trump.

The Chicago Tribune refused to run the February 7, 2005 strip, which inaccurately quoted Ted Kennedy. According to Stantis, the syndicate erroneously added quote marks to the dialogue without his permission.^[4] Later that year The Seattle Times refused to run a series of strips about the Terri Schiavo case.^[5] Later, a series of strips beginning August 25, 2008, accused the attendees of the 2008 Democratic National Convention of being communists.

• Mallard Fillmore – another conservative-themed comic strip