11 things to know about the former Ringling Bros. clown running for Congress

A clown is running for Congress in South Carolina.

That's not the punchline. That's the story.

His name is Steve Lough. He has been a professional clown for more than 30 years and on Friday, he filed papers to run for Congress to represent South Carolina's 5th District.

In a previous life, Lough worked under the big top for Ringling Bros. and Barnum & Bailey Circus, which explains why he's juggling five bright yellow balls in a video on his Steve Lough for Congress Facebook page.

Of course his candidacy inspires any number of "clowns in Congress" jokes — he wouldn't be the first clown to serve in Congress, aren't there already enough clowns in Congress? Rim shot, please.

And the man can sure rock a red nose.

But Lough is really not clowning around. He's inspired to run for a list of reasons, one of them the shooting at Sandy Hook Elementary School in Connecticut, an event he says affected him profoundly as someone who works around children.

Here are 11 things to know about this clown running for Congress.

1. Lough is pronounced "low." His campaign slogan: "Aim High! Vote Lough!" His campaign website is called ClownForCongress.com. The "o" in his last name on campaign advertising is a red clown nose.

2. He was born and raised in Camden, S.C. His parents worked at the local DuPont plant, according to Lough's campaign website. His mom was six months pregnant with him when his father died of a heart attack. "Steve’s mom was left to raise her three boys on her own," says the website. "One became a doctor, one a lawyer, and then there was Steve."

3. From the Ivy League to the Big Top. His bio says he graduated with a degree in anthropology from Dartmouth College, where he played one year of football. He credits financial aid and work-study jobs with helping him get a college education without the burden of huge debt.

He went from Dartmouth College to Ringling Bros. Clown College, he wrote in the Daily Kos last month.

He worked for Ringling for many years, and spent three years with the Kinoshita Circus in Japan.

4. Life is like a circus. "Living on the train, touring America by rail, and working with performers, both human and animal, from all different parts of the world was the best education of all," Lough's website says.

"When you sweat beside a person and laugh with them, wherever they are from, whatever the color of their skin, whatever God they worship, you learn to love all of humanity."

5. His wife is a former Ringling Bros. clown, too. She folded a giant paper crane during intermissions.

6. He doesn't like bullies. For the last 10 years he's performed 45-minute anti-bullying grade-school shows, sponsored by McDonald's, in North Carolina public schools.

7. He's a Democrat. He volunteered for Obama and Clinton, but his heart belongs to Bernie Sanders.

"I volunteered for the Obama campaign in ‘08 and ‘12 ... Hillary for most of ‘16 ... but I really found my heart in listening to Bernie talk about single payer health care," he wrote in the Daily Kos.

8. Health care for all. "My wife is Japanese ... and her father could not believe that the USA is so far behind in health care," Lough says in his campaign literature. "He feels sorry for us as a nation. So that’s one reason why I’m running."

9. Inspired by Sandy Hook. The day of the tragedy in December 2012, Lough was performing anti-bullying shows at a grade school on Camp Lejeune. He didn't hear about the shooting until he and his wife were on their way home listening to the radio.

"I regularly use 6-year-old volunteers in this show, and for the next 6 months, I had flashbacks and nightmares imagining what happened to those kids," he writes on his website.

He quickly learned he was six degrees of separation from several people at Sandy Hook and other tragedies.

"I found out the ringmaster, Jonathan Lee Iverson, went to Hartford music school with Jimmy Greene, the father of Ana, one of the victims," he writes. "An old clown friend went to high school with the principal of Sandy Hook.

"An older black woman in the senior center gym I went to in Benson, N.C., told me her daughter went to college with the teacher Victoria Soto. My cousin’s daughter was on the floor and knew the counselor who was one of the first victims at Virginia Tech. "

10. Already a race to watch. The current representative of the 5th congressional district is Republican Ralph Norman, who won the seat in a special election in June 2017, replacing Mick Mulvaney, who had become director of the U.S. Office of Management and Budget.

The Democrat who nearly beat him last summer, Archie Parnell, plans to run again. Mark Ali of Rock Hill, another Democrat, also reportedly plans to run. The Democratic primary is June 12.

"This news site has written repeatedly about deep Democratic divisions at the national and state level. Clearly those divisions will be on display in this race," writes FITSNews, a right-leaning, South Carolina-based news website.

"Obviously, that’s good news for the GOP. Of all the 'Republican' congressional districts in the Palmetto State, this one is the most poachable for South Carolina’s perpetual minority party.

"Norman’s narrow win in a contentious 2017 GOP special election — and his worse-than-expected showing against Parnell last June — have created an opening for Democrats.

"Unfortunately, it seems they are choosing to clown around instead …."

11. Doing it for Michu. "I used to work with a guy named Michu .... 33 inches tall ... he’d go out into ring 2 (the center ring) all by himself and dance to 'Hungarian Rhapsody' and bring the house down! Madison Square Garden! All by himself!" Lough writes on his website.

"I hope to do what Michu did, in honor of Michu .... It’s not the size of the dog in the fight, it’s the size of the fight in the dog!

"And, in case you didn’t know, it’s the year of the dog, and I’m ready to fight for Single Payer!

"If old Ralph and Archie aren’t afraid of clowns now, they will be shortly!"

This story was originally published March 26, 2018 at 1:35 PM with the headline "11 things to know about the former Ringling Bros. clown running for Congress."