Nancy Kassebaum Baker, trailblazing GOP senator who broke barriers for women in Congress, dead at 94

Former Kansas Sen.Nancy Kassebaum Baker speaks during a Milton S.Eisenhower Symposium at Johns Hopkins University in Baltimore, Oct.26, 2010.(JHU Sheridan Libraries/Gado/Getty Images)

Her election brought immediate national attention.By the time she announced her retirement, she was one of eight women serving in the Senate and the only woman chairing a Senate committee.

Kassebaum Baker also developed a reputation for working across party lines.A landmark 1996 health insurance law bore her name alongside that of Democratic Massachusetts Sen.Ted Kennedy.

Her political independence occasionally put her at odds with conservatives.She supported anassault weapons banbacked by then-PresidentBill Clintonand said the vote generated the angriest mail of her Senate career.

Kassebaum Baker remained highly popular in Kansas, winning re-election with 76% of the vote in 1984 and 74% in 1990.

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Sen.Nancy Kassebaum, R-Kan., during an appearance in Washington, D.C., in 1992.Kassebaum represented Kansas in the U.S.Senate from 1978 to 1997.(Mark Reinstein/Corbis via Getty Images)

She married former Republican Sen.Howard Baker of Tennessee in 1996, shortly before leaving the Senate.It marked the first marriage between a man and woman who had both served in the Senate.

Howard Baker, who served as President Ronald Reagan’s chief of staff and later as U.S.ambassador to Japan under President George W.Bush, died in 2014.

Kassebaum Baker continued public service after leaving Congress, including serving on a bipartisan commission oncampaign finance reformduring the Clinton administration.

Later in life, she increasingly broke with the Republican Party’s direction and endorsed Democrats in several Kansas races, includingDemocratic Gov.Laura Kelly.

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Former Kansas Sen.Nancy Kassebaum Baker attends the Kansas State Fair in Hutchinson, Kansas, on Sept.19, 2015.(Mark Reinstein/Corbis via Getty Images)

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She also called for PresidentDonald Trump’s impeachmentfollowing the Jan.6, 2021, attack on the U.S.Capitol.

“This just has gone too far,” she told Kansas City’s KMBC at the time.

Despite her decades in national politics, Kassebaum Baker maintained a close identification with Kansas.

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Before leaving for Japan during her husband’s ambassadorship, she reflected on what she would miss.

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“All I can say is, I will miss the Kansas prairie,” she said.

The Associated Press contributed to this report.