Melissa Gilbert Reflects on Why She Ended Her 2016 Congressional Campaign

Melissa Gilbert ran for Congress in 2016, but had to drop out part way through the race due to health concerns. In her 2022 memoir, Back to the Prairie, the actor looked back at her devastating decision to call the race per her doctor’s orders. Here’s what happened, in the Laura Ingalls actor’s words. 

The health issue that led to Melissa Gilbert calling her run for Congress

Throughout the entirety of Gilbert’s campaign, she was in “tremendous pain” due to a herniated disc pressing on nerves in her neck. And each day, it got worse. 

“At first, I kept the problem from everyone but Tim [Busfield, her husband],” she wrote. “Then, it was impossible to hide it. It turned my manageable migraines into crippling events, and I suffered from terrible spasms in my neck, numbness in my right hand, and excruciating pain every time I turned my head.”

To get through the days, Gilbert was taking a lot of pain killers.  

“I was popping Percocet like they were Pez and regularly calling time-outs to get spinal blocks and epidurals,” she wrote. 

Gilbert says the moment the “alarms finally went off” was when she asked her neurologist about morphine. At that point, Busfield asked her doctor directly if she should still be running for office. 

“My neurologist said no, I was risking permanent spinal damage if I continued rather than focus on taking care of myself,” wrote Gilbert.

Gilbert started sobbing when she broke the news to her campaign team 

The day after Gilbert and Busfield spoke to the Little House alum’s doctor, they gathered with her campaign staff to deliver the news. 

“They gathered around our dining room table, where I sat forlornly with my head bowed while Tim broke the news because I couldn’t speak: My doctor wanted me to pull out of the campaign and prepare for surgery,” she wrote. “When it was my turn to address these dedicated individuals, I just started sobbing.” 

“I can’t do this anymore,” she cried. “I can’t move with this kind of pain. I have to listen to my doctor before I do permanent damage. And I’ve got to stop taking these pain meds.”

Gilbert’s team was completely supportive, though they appeared devastated. 

Why Gilbert’s name stayed on the ballot

While Gilbert’s campaign team offered their sympathies and understanding, the actor says “I couldn’t say the same for my Republican opponents.”

“Republicans fought to keep my name on the ballot rather than allow a substitute candidate, arguing that I hadn’t ‘adequately proved that [I] would be physically unfit to serve in Congress.’ I thought they were despicable,” she wrote. 

But the biggest battle Gilbert faced, she says, was the disappointment she felt in herself.  

“I truly thought I could win and, most important, help people who needed help,” she wrote. “That was the reason I got into the race in the first place. I saw a need and wanted to make a difference in people’s lives. And I believed I could. That was a terribly difficult idea to relinquish, especially in the summer of 2016, when I saw a shift taking place around me and in the country in general that I feared would ultimately result in more harm than help.”

But there was no ignoring what Gilbert’s body was telling her. She needed to take a step back and slow down before it was too late.  

Read more about Gilbert’s life and involvement in politics in Back to the Prairie: A Home Remade, A Life Rediscovered.