Actor Patrick Dempsey, best known to many viewers as Dr. Derek Shepherd on Grey’s Anatomy, says he has no plans to enter politics. Instead, the Maine native says he wants to keep serving people through charity work and community support.
In an op-ed for the Portland Press Herald, Dempsey addressed speculation that he might run for the United States Senate. He said many Mainers have approached him recently and urged him to consider a campaign, especially as Democratic candidate Graham Platner has faced a series of sexual assault allegations.
Dempsey said he was grateful for the confidence people had placed in him, but he made clear that public office is not where he believes he can do the most good.
His answer was direct: he is not running.
Dempsey pointed to his work with the Dempsey Center, the cancer support organization he founded in honor of his mother, as the kind of service he wants to continue. The center provides care and support for people affected by cancer, and Dempsey said that work has shaped the way he thinks about community, leadership, and public life.
“The Dempsey Center has shown me what’s possible when people put aside differences and focus on helping one another,” he wrote. “I’ve watched volunteers, healthcare professionals, small businesses, major corporations, donors and neighbors come together for one purpose: caring for people during some of the hardest moments of their lives.”
That, he suggested, is the model of service he believes the country needs more of.
Dempsey emphasized that the center’s work is not built around politics or partisanship. People show up because someone is in need, not because they agree on every issue.
“No one asks who you voted for before offering support,” he wrote. “That’s the America I know. That’s what I want to see in the leader we send to the Senate.”
He also argued that democracy requires more than voting. It depends on trust, accountability, respect for the Constitution, and the ability to see people with different views as fellow Americans rather than enemies.
Dempsey closed the piece on a hopeful note. He said he has seen too much kindness to give up on the country: communities coming together around families in crisis, strangers becoming caregivers, and people giving generously without expecting anything in return.
Those parts of America, he wrote, are still real, even if they are often drowned out by the loudest voices.
“Whether you’re an elected official, a teacher, a nurse, a business owner, a parent or a volunteer, service begins with one simple question: How can I make someone else’s life a little better?” Dempsey wrote.
That, he said, is the work he wants to keep doing.
“So no, I’m not running for office.”