Melissa Gilbert Addresses Megyn Kelly’s Comments on Epstein’s ‘Girls,’ Shares Her Own ‘Shocking’ Experience on Little House at 15

Melissa Gilbert is calling out Megyn Kelly after the political commentator questioned whether Jeffrey Epstein should be labeled a pedophile because the victims she was aware of were teens.

The actress, 61, joined the #iWasFifteen hashtag trend — a response sparked by Kelly’s comments suggesting Epstein “was into the barely legal type.” The trend involves women sharing photos of themselves at age 15 to highlight how young and vulnerable they truly were.

On the Nov. 12 episode of The Megyn Kelly Show on Sirius XM, Kelly, 54, said Epstein “liked 15-year-old girls,” adding, “I realize this is disgusting. I’m definitely not trying to make an excuse for this… there’s a difference between a 15-year-old and a 5-year-old, you know?”

Gilbert posted on Instagram on Nov. 15, explaining that she looked up photos of herself from that age — and found images from Little House on the Prairie — where she, as a minor, was required to perform romantic scenes with a much older co-star, Dean Butler.

She shared a carousel including screenshots from the show and a personal vacation photo, writing:

“I am actually nauseated. The girl on vacation in Hawaii with her family is the same girl who was expected to ‘fall in love with’ and kiss a man on film who was several years older than she was. Through the lens of today, this is shocking. I have no words other than to say, ‘I WAS A CHILD.’ ‘I WAS FIFTEEN.’ And I was the good news.”

Gilbert added that she was lucky to have a strong support system on set — including Michael Landon, her mother, and “so many others” — to make sure she was protected.

“Can you imagine if I hadn’t had them all? I am so fortunate (Sort of). Many other young women aren’t. @megynkelly you need to be careful with your words,” she continued.

Butler has previously reflected on the significant age gap between himself and Gilbert when their on-screen love story began, saying he wished they had been closer in age while filming. Their characters shared their first kiss during season six — when Gilbert was 15 and Butler was 23.

“Laura was 10 years younger than Almanzo. But from the perspective of playing it, I thought, wouldn’t it be great if we could have had a little more common ground,” he said in a past interview.

This isn’t the first time Gilbert has criticized Kelly. Earlier this year, Kelly reacted to news of a planned Little House on the Prairie reboot by accusing Netflix of pushing a “woke” agenda. Gilbert shot back on Threads, suggesting Kelly rewatch the original series:

“TV doesn’t get too much more ‘woke’ than we did. We tackled: racism, addiction, nativism, antisemitism, misogyny, rape, spousal abuse and every other ‘woke’ topic you can think of. Thank you very much.”