Melissa Gilbert has had a pretty productive post-acting career, having served as the president of the Screen Actors Guild from 2001 to 2005. But now she’s taking her passion for activism to Capitol Hill — Gilbert announced that she’s running for Congress in her home district in Michigan. She moved there with husband Timothy Busfield two years ago and campaigned for Democratic gubernatorial candidate Mark Schauer in 2014. Now, she’s going to get ready to go head-to-head with the sitting first-term Republican Rep. Mike Bishop, who has been considered vulnerable.
“I’m running for Congress to make life a little easier for all the families who feel they have fallen through the cracks in today’s economy,” Gilbert said in a statement. “I believe building a new economy is a team effort, and we need to bring fresh voices to the table to get the job done.”
Gilbert is running as a Democrat and has already been called a “tax cheat” by her opponent, who also said that while she cannot afford to pay for the hundreds of thousands of dollars she owes in back taxes, she “can afford a stylist for her dog.” (Gilbert has apparently arranged a payment plan with the IRS for this problem, and maybe her dog is just really demanding. It’s just a thought.)
Source: U.S. News & World Report
