Claire McCaskill

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Claire McCaskill
Junior Senator from Missouri
Incumbent
Assumed office  January 3, 2007 Serving with Kit Bond
Preceded by	James Talent
Born	July 24, 1953 (1953-07-24) (age 54) Rolla, Missouri, USA
Political party	Democratic
Spouse	David Exposito (div.) Joseph Shepard
Alma mater	University of Missouri
Profession	Attorney
Religion	Roman Catholic

Claire McCaskill (born July 24, 1953) is an American Democratic politician, currently the junior United States Senator from the state of Missouri and former State Auditor of Missouri. She defeated Republican Senator Jim Talent in 2006 by a margin of 50% to 47%. Along with Amy Klobuchar of Minnesota, she is one of two female senators in the 110th United States Congress freshman class. She is the first woman elected to the Senate from Missouri in her own right.

[edit] Biography

McCaskill was born in Rolla, Missouri. McCaskill's father, William Y. McCaskill, served as a state Insurance Commissioner during the administration of Governor Warren E. Hearnes. Her mother Betty Anne was the first woman elected to the City Council of Columbia MO. Interestingly, Betty Anne McCaskill lost a race for a seat in the state House of Representatives to Leroy Blunt, Governor Matt Blunt's grandfather. McCaskill spent her early childhood in the small Missouri town of Houston, later moving to Lebanon, and eventually Columbia. McCaskill attended David H. Hickman High School in Columbia, where she was a cheerleader, Pep Club president, and was elected homecoming queen. While attending the University of Missouri, McCaskill joined Kappa Alpha Theta sorority, graduating in 1975 with a B.A. in political science. She received her Juris Doctor (J.D.) from law school at the same institution in 1978.

[edit] Early career

Except for three years spent in private practice as an attorney at the firm of a leading Kansas City trial lawyer (1989 to 1991), McCaskill has worked in the public sector continuously since graduating from law school in 1978. Claire, following her graduation from law school, spent one year as a law clerk on the Missouri Court of Appeals for the Western District, which sits in Kansas City. Thereafter, McCaskill joined the Jackson County prosecutor's office where she specialized in arson cases. In 1982, McCaskill was elected to represent the Brookside neighborhood of Kansas City in the Missouri House of Representatives, where she became the first female attorney to serve in that body in approximately 40 years. During her time in the House, McCaskill became the first Missouri state lawmaker to give birth while in office. McCaskill left the state House to contemplate running for Jackson County Prosecutor in 1988, but did not pursue the position when fellow Democrat and incumbent Prosecutor Albert Riederer decided to seek another term. In 1990, McCaskill was elected to the Jackson County Legislature (the equivalent of a county commission or county council). In 1991, McCaskill made a bold announcement when she expressed her intention to run for County Prosecutor. The announcement was significant in that the elected Democratic Prosecutor Riederer had not announced that he wasn't going to seek re-election. McCaskill then went on to an impressive victory in capturing the Jackson County Prosecutor's Office in 1992.

McCaskill was the first woman to serve as Jackson County Prosecutor, and was re-elected to that office in 1996. During her time in office she gave the office a nationwide presence and reputation through innovative and progressive programs and prosecutions.

In 1998 McCaskill was elected to the position of State Auditor, and was the second woman State Auditor after her predecessor, Margaret B. Kelly.

[edit] 2004 gubernatorial campaign

On August 3, 2004, McCaskill defeated Governor Bob Holden in the Democratic primary race, becoming the first person to defeat an incumbent governor in a primary election in state history.^[1] McCaskill also was the first primary challenger to defeat an incumbent Governor in the United States since 1994,^[2] when Bill Janklow defeated Walter Dale Miller in South Dakota, and Myrth York defeated Bruce Sundlun in Rhode Island. Despite McCaskill's victory, however, she was criticized by some Democrats for accepting campaign contributions from Anheuser-Busch, who had pulled their support for Holden after he vetoed a concealed weapons bill passed by the state legislature. On November 2, 2004, McCaskill lost to then-Secretary of State Matt Blunt in the general election by a margin of 51% to 48%. Key to Blunt's victory were large margins in the rural parts of the state. McCaskill's loss to Blunt was the first defeat in her 20-year political career.^[3]

[edit] 2006 Senate race

Both Talent and McCaskill easily defeated their opponents in their respective primaries on August 8, 2006.

McCaskill and Talent debated each other on Meet the Press on October 8, 2006.^[4]

On November 8, 2006, McCaskill narrowly defeated Talent. While Talent received more votes in many of the more rural areas of the state, McCaskill ran stronger there than she had in the 2004 Governor's race. Also, she again had a large majority over Talent in the St. Louis and Kansas City metropolitan areas.

[edit] Senator

On November 15, 2006, Senate Majority Leader in waiting Harry Reid assigned McCaskill to five committees:

• Senate Armed Services Committee
  • Subcommittee on Airland
  • Subcommittee on Personnel
  • Subcommittee on Readiness and Management Support
• Senate Commerce Committee
  • Subcommittee on Aviation Operations, Safety, and Security
  • Subcommittee on Consumer Affairs, Insurance, and Automotive Safety
  • Subcommittee on Interstate Commerce, Trade, and Tourism
  • Subcommittee on Science, Technology, and Innovation
  • Subcommittee on Surface Transportation and Merchant Marine Infrastructure, Safety and Security
• Senate Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Committee
  • Ad Hoc Subcommittee on State, Local, and Private Sector Preparedness and Integration
  • Permanent Subcommittee on Investigations
  • Subcommittee on Federal Financial Management, Government Information, Federal Services, and International Security
• Senate Indian Affairs Committee
• Senate Aging Committee

[edit] Personal life

McCaskill was married to David Exposito, with whom she had three children — a son, Austin Esposito, and two daughters, Maddie Esposito and Lily Esposito. Additionally, from her marriage to Exposito, she has three stepchildren. The couple divorced in 1995. The divorce occurred while McCaskill was Jackson County Prosecutor. Exposito was found murdered in Kansas City, Kansas on December 12, 2005^[5]

In April 2002, McCaskill married St. Louis businessman Joseph Shepard. From her marriage to Shepard, she has four stepchildren. Shepard loaned $1.6 million to McCaskill's 2004 gubernatorial campaign, and also had business interests in the nursing home industry. Because as state auditor McCaskill was responsible for auditing the Missouri Department of Health and Senior Services, which regulates the state's nursing home system, Shepard's financial interests in the industry became an issue during the 2004 gubernatorial campaign.^[6]

In May 2007, an invitation for McCaskill to speak at the graduation of her daughter Maddie at Catholic St. Joseph's Academy in St Louis was withdrawn after the school president was contacted by a call from diocesan officials because her positions on abortion and stem cell research.^[7]

[edit] U.S. Senate

McCaskill entered the U.S. Senate promising to raise the minimum wage and working with her counterpart from Missouri, Sen. Kit Bond, who was from the opposition party. McCaskill introduced legislation with Sen. Barack Obama (D-IL) after the Walter Reed Army Medical Center neglect scandal erupted, which demanded the full accountability of wounded veterans and agencies that would ensure physical and mental health conditions being addressed.

"Those who have fought this war and felt its effects most personally, our servicemen and women, deserve to have a real researched plan for dealing with the aftermath of their sacrifice, so that the mistakes made by the administration in war planning are not repeated in planning for the readjustment needs of these heroes," McCaskill noted on the Senate floor after Sen. Obama made comments about the same issue. McCaskill also took Secretary of Veterans Affairs Jim Nicholson to task over the "irresponsibility" regarding overlooking the Department of Veterans Affairs.^[8]

In the Senate Armed Services Committee, McCaskill has made herself known for being aggressive by questioning officials in the Department of Defense and their "loose" spending habits. McCaskill grilled top officials of the military's auditing agencies for rewarding KBR for their Logistics Civil Augmentation Program (LOGCAP) contract, a contract now valued at over $20 billion, despite audit reports indicating extreme contractor mismanagement and expansive overcharging of the U.S. government.^[9]

McCaskill invoked the name of President Harry Truman, who was one of the predecessors to McCaskill's current seat, by indicating the Truman Committee.

A November 2007 poll has McCaskill's approval rating at 48%, with 46% disapproving. The same poll shows McCaskill with support of 71% of Democrats, 35% of independents, and 29% of Republicans.^[10]

McCaskill has denounced the use of earmarks and pork barrel spending, and with Russ Feingold she is one of only two Democratic senators that have sworn not to use earmarks.^[11]

In January 2008, Claire McCaskill decided to endorse Senator Barack Obama in his campaign for the Democratic nomination for the presidential elections of 2008. She has been one of the most visible faces for his campaign ^[12]. She has credited her daughter Maddie as the one who made her publicly endorse Obama ^{[13] [14]}.

[edit] Notes

• McCaskill was the only incoming Senator who skipped freshman orientation due to a promised vacation to her family following her strenuous campaign.
• McCaskill is a parishioner at St. Joseph Catholic Church in Jefferson City and St. Gerard Majella Catholic Church in St. Louis.
• McCaskill, taking over the seat once held by Harry Truman, has vowed to question the Executive Branch and root out corruption, much as Truman questioned wartime contracts awarded by officials in the Franklin Roosevelt administration during World War II.
• McCaskill is the first elected woman to represent Missouri in the U.S. Senate. Jean Carnahan was appointed to the U.S. Senate, following her husband's death, but was defeated in a close election by Jim Talent.
• McCaskill was the third woman to defeat an incumbent Senator; the other two were Debbie Stabenow (D-Michigan) and Maria Cantwell (D-Washington), who both defeated incumbents in 2000.
• McCaskill was widely heralded for her political savvy when she bought 100 St. Louis Rams tickets so that the game could be broadcast. She donated the tickets to charity^[15]

[edit] Electoral history

[edit] References

• Official Senate Website
• Missouri State Auditor Website
• Senate Campaign Website
• DSCC Biography

[edit] External links

• United States Senator Claire McCaskill official Senate site

• Biography at the Biographical Directory of the United States Congress
• Voting record maintained by The Washington Post
• Campaign finance reports and data at the Federal Election Commission
• Campaign contributions at OpenSecrets.org
• Biography, voting record, and interest group ratings at Project Vote Smart
• Issue positions and quotes at On The Issues

[edit] Succession boxes

v • d • e United States Senators from Missouri Class 1: Benton • Geyer • Polk • Henderson • Schurz • Cockrell • Warner • Reed • Patterson • Truman • Briggs • Kem • Symington • Danforth • Ashcroft • Carnahan • Talent • McCaskill Class 3: Barton • Buckner • Linn • Atchison • Green • Johnson • Wilson • Drake • Jewett • Blair • Bogy • Armstrong • Shields • Vest • Stone • Wilfley • Spencer • Williams • Hawes • Clark • Donnell • Hennings • Long • Eagleton • Bond