Claire Conner McCaskill (; born July 24, 1953) is an American politician who served as a United States Senator from Missouri from 2007 to 2019 and as State Auditor of Missouri from 1999 to 2007. McCaskill is a native of Rolla, Missouri. She graduated from the University of Missouri and the University of Missouri School of Law. A member of the Democratic Party, McCaskill served as a member of the Missouri House of Representatives from 1983 to 1989, as Jackson County Prosecutor from 1993 to 1998, and as the 34th State Auditor of Missouri from 1999 to 2007. She ran for Governor of Missouri in the 2004 election, defeating Democratic incumbent Bob Holden in the Democratic primary and losing to Republican Matt Blunt in a close general election. McCaskill was elected to the U.S. Senate in 2006. While the 2nd female senator to have represented Missouri, she is the 1st female candidate elected to the Senate from Missouri. (Jean Carnahan was appointed upon the death of her husband.) Re-elected in 2012, McCaskill was defeated in 2018 by Republican challenger Josh Hawley. , McCaskill is a political analyst for MSNBC and NBC and a visiting fellow at the University of Chicago Institute of Politics. Early life, education and early law career McCaskill was born in Rolla, Missouri. Her father, William Young McCaskill (1925–1993), served as a state Insurance Commissioner during the administration of Governor Warren E. Hearnes. Her mother, Betty Anne (née Ward; 1928–2012), was the first woman elected to the city council of Columbia, Missouri. Betty Anne McCaskill lost a race for a seat in the state House of Representatives to Leroy Blunt, the father of U.S. Senator Roy Blunt and grandfather of former Missouri Governor Matt Blunt. McCaskill spent her early childhood in the small Missouri town of Houston, later moving to Lebanon, and eventually Columbia. She attended David H. Hickman High School in Columbia, where she was a cheerleader, Pep Club president, a member of the debate club, a musical cast member, and 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 the University of Missouri School of Law in 1978. In the summer of 1974, before graduating from the University of Missouri, McCaskill studied at the Institute on Comparative Political and Economic Systems at Georgetown University.