Sex in the City fans will always call her Miranda, and to her three kids she’s Mom, but actress Cynthia Nixon is now hoping to be addressed as something else: Governor.


This week Nixon, who played the ambitious lawyer Miranda Hobbs on the beloved HBO series, announced her official bid for state governor. She’ll challenge incumbent Gov. Andrew Cuomo in the state’s Democratic primary this September.

“I love New York. I’ve never wanted to live anywhere else,” Nixon says in her campaign launch video, “but something has to change.”

The video begins with shots of Nixon at home with her sons and her wife Christine Marinoni, and follows along as Nixon walks 7-year-old Max to school.

With this announcement, it seems Nixon is just as ambitious and goal-oriented as her character on Sex in the City. Although she’s never held public office, the 51-year-old activist believes she has what it takes to improve the state’s education system and close its ever-widening income gap.

Nixon is not new to public advocacy. A long-time education advocate, she served on New York City Mayor Bill de Blasio’s advisory board for the Mayor’s Fund to Advance New York City, according to CNN. Nixon’s wife of six years, Christine Marinoni, also worked for de Blasio as his senior advisor for community partnerships before resigning a month ago. (The couple has contributed to de Blasio’s mayoral campaign.)

Back in 2002, when her oldest (daughter Samantha) was just five years old, Nixon was arrested for protesting cuts to public schools, according to People.

If Nixon’s gubernatorial bid is successful it will mark several firsts for New York State, as she would be New York’s first female and first openly gay governor, and the first mom to hold the office.

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