McCaskill paid her way through the University of Missouri by waitressing and busing tables and graduated with a B.A. in political science in 1975. She then enrolled in the University of Missouri School of Law, earning her J.D. in 1977.

After graduation, McCaskill moved to Kansas City and worked as an assistant prosecutor dealing primarily with sexual abuse and arson cases. She ran for office for the first time in 1982, winning a seat in the Missouri legislature that she would hold until 1988.

McCaskill married David Exposito in May 1984, and the couple would have three children before divorcing in 1995. The year before the divorce, Exposito was arrested for marijuana possession on a riverboat casino - an embarrassing disclosure for McCaskill, who was a public officeholder at the time. McCaskill remarried in April 2002 to Joseph Shepard, a wealthy St. Louis real-estate developer.

Electoral History

In 1992, McCaskill was elected the first female prosecutor of Jackson County, Mo. As prosecutor, she toughened enforcement of the county's domestic violence laws and opened a court to help non-violent drug offenders enter rehabilitation. McCaskill supports the death penalty, and she often touted her law-and-order credentials in later political races.

McCaskill mounted a successful run for Missouri state auditor in 1998 after being recruited by then-Gov. Mel Carnahan (D). She threw herself into the work, embarking on a crusade against government inefficiency and waste with performance-based audits that generated substantial media attention in Missouri, leading some lawmakers to accuse her of grandstanding.

McCaskill flexed her political might in 2004 when she took on Missouri's incumbent governor, Bob Holden (D), in the Democratic primary. Holden's tumultuous term as governor had eroded his popularity in the state, and McCaskill seized on the discontent, becoming the first person to oust a sitting governor in a Missouri primary.

In the general election, McCaskill faced Republican Matt Blunt, son of then-House Majority Leader Roy Blunt (R-Mo.), in the general election. She positioned herself as a moderate Democrat, emphasizing her opposition to wasteful government spending, while Blunt hammered her stances on social issues.

Blunt was triumphant on Election Day, dealing McCaskill the first loss of her long career in Missouri politics. McCaskill did well with urban voters but lost decisively among rural voters - a mistake she would take pains to correct during her Senate campaign.In 2005, McCaskill's ex-husband David Exposito was found dead on a Kansas City street with a gunshot wound to the neck. Police said he had been thrown from a car after being shot, and his 1979 Thunderbird was discovered nearby with its gold rims missing.

McCaskill had her sights set on another gubernatorial run when Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee Chairman Sen. Chuck Schumer (D-N.Y.) began courting her to challenge then-Sen. Jim Talent (R-Mo.) in the 2006 election. Schumer felt Democrats could only win the politically split state with a moderate candidate like McCaskill, and his relentless recruitment pitch eventually convinced her to toss her hat into the ring.

Missouri was a crucial 2006 battleground for the Democratic Party, and the McCaskill-Talent matchup was one of the most closely-watched Senate races in the country. McCaskill ran as a straight-talking reformer who would beat back Washington corruption, and she linked her opponent to the unpopular policies of President Bush at every opportunity. "[Jim Talent] agrees with President Bush more than I agree with my husband," she said.

Talent responded with a barrage of personal attacks, accusing McCaskill of going easy on the state's nursing home industry as auditor to help her husband, who made part of his fortune in the industry. Other attacks took aim at the couple's finances, leading McCaskill to repeatedly say Republicans were trying to caricature her as "Satan's sister."

One of the biggest issues in the Senate race was stem-cell research, partly because of a state initiative that was on the ballot to allow the practice. A few weeks before Election Day the actor Michael J. Fox, who is suffering from Parkinson's disease, recorded a powerful television ad backing McCaskilland criticizing Talent for his opposition to stem-cell projects. The ad generated national headlines after conservative radio host Rush Limbaugh accused Fox of exaggerating his Parkinson's symptoms and letting Democrats "exploit" his illness.

During the campaign, McCaskill spent a significant amount of time on the stump in rural communities, and the outreach effort paid off. McCaskill performed strongly outside her usual urban strongholds, defeating Talent with nearly 50 percent of the vote and helping Democrats eke out a narrow 51 to 49 majority in the Senate.

Alliance with Obama

McCaskill's relationship with Barack Obama was forged during her 2006 Senate campaign. Obama crisscrossed the country that year to mobilize Democratic voters, and he traveled to Missouri multiple times for McCaskill, holding fundraisers on her behalf and even appearing in St. Louis on the eve of the election.

In 2008 McCaskill returned the favor, giving Obama a key endorsement just days after his loss in the New Hampshire primary to rival Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton (D-N.Y.). McCaskill was the first female senator to endorse Obama, and she provided a critical boost to his candidacy during a difficult time. "Sen. Obama understood very clearly the risk [McCaskill] took," Obama spokesman Josh Earnest said. "Her endorsement was really, really important, being a woman, when he was in a contested primary with the most popular woman in the Democratic Party."

Many observers considered McCaskill a top contender for a cabinet job in an Obama administration, but she squelched the speculation before Obama even won the presidency, telling the St. Louis Dispatch, "I'm the first one of my partisan stripe in a long time to serve in the United States Senate from Missouri. I feel a special obligation to continue in the Senate."

Having gained Obama's tacit backing, McCaskill will likely take on a more prominent legislative role in the 111th Congress and serve as a bridge between the White House and the Senate.

Plane Controversy

In early 2011, McCaskill sparked controversy when Politico reported that she had used her private plane for at least one political trip around Missouri. On March 21, 2011, she said she would "sell the damn plane."

McCaskill admitted to reporters she had inadvertently failed to pay property taxes to the state for the plane from 2007 to 2010 in the amount of $287,273.

"I have discovered that the personal property taxes on the plane have not been paid. There should have been a reporting to the county of the existence of this planeThere are people I could blame for this, but I know better. I take full responsibility,"

But that didn't stop the National Republican Senatorial Committee from cutting TV ads exploiting the controversy featuring "ClaireAir" in what will be a tough 2012 reelection bid.

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