Cynthia Nixon, star of ‘Sex and the City,’ announces New York governor bid

The actress is challenging fellow Democrat and current Governor Andrew Cuomo

Cynthia Nixon, the actress who played Miranda Hobbes on HBO's Sex and the City, announced her bid to run for New York governor in a tweet.

The Brooklyn, New York resident will run against current governor and fellow Democrat Andrew Cuomo. Ms Nixon tweeted: "I love New York, and today I am announcing my candidacy for governor," accompanied by a video.

Ms Nixon has said she is a "progressive activist who is running for governor to fight for a better, more equal New York".

In the video she noted that she has "never lived anywhere else," growing up in the city as the child of a single mother in a one-bedroom flat who had initially become an actress as a means of supporting herself while attending university at Barnard College in New York.

“I just think we need to have more people of color and women and LGBT people not just represented — but leading...If we want to fix our world, they know what’s wrong with it because they’ve been on the short end of the stick," Ms Nixon had told People magazine when rumours had begun swirling about her bid.

Since the massively popular series ended, she has become known for her activism in LGBTQ rights, public education advocacy, and reproductive rights.

She will be the first openly gay candidate for the state's governor, married to prominent LGBTQ activist Christine Marinoni who until recently worked directly with New York City's Deputy Mayor Richard Buery.

It may bode well for the 51-year-old mother of three to have close ties to Mayor Bill de Blasio, who has butted heads frequently with Mr Cuomo on a number of issues between the city and the state, most recently the state of much-needed repairs to the subway system.

She had accused Mr Cuomo in the past of being the reason for inequality between the states's "richest" and "poorest" schools as well as "shortchanging the children of New York State," in an appearance on the talk show The View.

Ms Nixon faces a tough fight against the two-time incumbent and Mr Cuomo's $30m campaign fund after issuing a statement on her campaign website indicating she would not "be accepting any corporate contributions in this campaign". She also may not be able to bank on the show's immense popularity for her own as a politician. A new poll released by Siena College had Mr Cuomo up 66 per cent to Ms Nixon's 19 per cent with New York Democrats.

The actress and social activist also faced a 20 per cent favourable to 19 per cent unfavourable rating among all New Yorkers in the same poll - with the overwhelming majority of 60 per cent having no opinion at all. She also saw a similar unfavourable rating with Democrats in the Empire state.

"While Nixon does a little better among younger and upstate Democrats, she doesn't have the support of more than one-quarter of either group," pollster Steven Greenberg told New York Daily News.

The one saving grace may be that poll numbers showed New Yorkers' split views on a third-term by Mr Cuomo, a political legacy in the state after his father Mario was a three-term Governor as well. Forty-eight per cent said they could vote for him while and 46 per cent said they preferred fresh blood in the state capital of Albany.