“I’ve always wanted to run for office, and I just decided that now is the time,” Melissa Bird says.

Bird — small business owner, lay preacher, social worker and descendant of the Shivwits Band of Southern Paiutes — is running against incumbent Rep. Val Hoyle for the Democratic nomination in the May primary for Oregon’s 4th Congressional District seat. 

Bird says she decided “enough is enough” and chose to run after the Trump administration stripped away her husband’s dream job at the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration when it terminated hundreds of employees from the agency in early 2025.

Her top priorities, Bird says, are housing, health care and unjust Immigration and Customs Enforcement practices. While she emphasizes that other topics are high on her priority list, these three are integral to her campaign and her beliefs. “I’m a Native woman and we’ve been doing this to brown people for over 500 years,” Bird says of ICE unlawfully detaining citizens. “This is what happened to my people, my grandparents, to my great grandparents and to my ancestors. I absolutely cannot in good faith or conscience support the separation and removal of people from their families.” 

Bird, who holds a doctorate degree in social work, is a part of Citizens Impeachment, a volunteer group dedicated to advocating for the impeachment and prosecution of President Donald Trump. Bird is one of 62 candidates involved with the organization and pledges that she, along with her colleagues, will introduce impeachment articles every day until Trump is impeached. “I’m deeply disturbed about what’s happening, particularly with everything that’s happening in Minnesota and also what’s happening with Native and Indigenous people,” Bird says.

She says that if she wins, she will support the Rural New Deal health care model put forward by the Rural-Urban Bridge Initiative and the Progressive Democrats of America. It focuses on five principles and 10 pillars to “rebuild local economies across rural America.” 

The platform calls for reforming health care by increasing the number of clinics, investing in effective programs for addiction prevention and treatment and even piloting “farmacy” programs that allow health care providers to write prescriptions for the purchase of healthy foods.

Bird says she hopes to increase access to housing by working directly with communities to determine what solution works for each specific scenario. “What’s going to work in Eugene is not going to work in Corvallis and what’s going to work in Corvallis is not going to work in Roseburg,” says Bird, who lives in Corvallis. “I think this really comes back to asking people in the community what they need instead of telling them what they need.”

Bird says the country needs leaders who are willing to speak out and lift the voices of people who are often ignored and left behind. “I just don’t see that happening in our district,” she says. Bird is running against Hoyle, who’s served in the U.S. House of Representatives since 2023. “I am not the only person challenging Val Hoyle in this race,” Bird says. “I think we should be questioning not just representative Hoyle but also everyone who is running for the seat.” 

Boris “Bo” Weidenfeld-Needham, longtime Eugene wine merchant and 50501 Eugene leader, announced in July 2025 that he was running as a Democrat against Hoyle, and Hoyle’s 2024 Republican challenger, Monique DeSpain, who Hoyle beat handily, is running again.

So far, Bird’s campaign has received over $17,000 in contributions. “I want voters to know that I am not taking corporate money. I am not taking AIPAC [American Israel Public Affairs Committee] money,” Bird says. “Every single dollar that is raised in this campaign is raised by people who support this vision and this mission of electing people to office who care about the people absolutely.” 

Hoyle’s campaign has raised $644,702 so far and Weidenfeld-Needham has raised $2,260.

Bird says she believes she stands out from other candidates because she’s a Native, working class woman who knows the struggles of the average American. “Voters deserve someone who represents them,” Bird says.  “We deserve leaders in office who are going to rise for this occasion and fight like hell against the rise of fascism in this country.”