Nicole LeFavour, an openly gay state
senator from Idaho, on Friday announced her bid for the U.S. House of
Representatives.
“I'm running for Congress because I
love Idaho and we can do better,” LeFavour tweeted on Friday.
LeFavour's bid to represent Idaho's 2nd
Congressional District, currently held by Republican Rep. Mike
Simpson, was a surprise to many since only a few days earlier she had
announced that she wouldn't return to the Idaho Senate.
She told The
New York Times that Republican opposition to a gay
protections bill which she had sponsored was behind her decision to
leave state politics.
“People are just being politically
unbelievably spineless,” she said in reference to a committee vote
against the measure.
LeFavour must first survive a May 15
Democratic primary against Jack Chappell and Eldon Wallace to become
the candidate to challenge Rep. Mike Simpson in the fall.
In
a statement, she said she was entering the race because “sadly
I feel Congress is not doing all it could to set our economy right.”
Half of Congress' openly gay members
won't return next year. Massachusetts Congressman Barney Frank last
year announced his retirement and Wisconsin Rep. Tammy Baldwin is
running for the U.S. Senate.