Hutchison, Kay Bailey, 1943-

<p>Kay Bailey Hutchison (born Kathryn Ann Bailey; July 22, 1943) is an American attorney, television correspondent, politician, diplomat and the 22nd United States Permanent Representative to NATO from 2017 until 2021. A member of the Republican Party, she previously was a United States Senator from Texas from 1993 to 2013.</p>

<p>Born in Galveston, Texas, Hutchison is a graduate of the University of Texas at Austin. Prior to entering politics, she was an attorney and legal correspondent at KPRC-TV in Houston. She was a member of the Texas House of Representatives from 1972 to 1976. After a brief business career, she returned to politics in 1990 when she was elected Texas State Treasurer. In 1993, she was elected to the United States Senate in a nonpartisan special election, defeating Democratic incumbent Bob Krueger and becoming the first female senator in Texas history.</p>

<p>After being reelected to the Senate in 1994, 2000, and 2006, Hutchison was an unsuccessful candidate for Governor of Texas in 2010, losing the Republican primary to incumbent Rick Perry. Hutchison was the most senior female Republican senator by the end of her tenure in 2013, and the fifth most senior female senator overall. In 2013, she joined the law firm Bracewell & Giuliani.</p>

<p>On June 29, 2017, Hutchison was nominated by President Donald Trump to be the next United States Permanent Representative to NATO. She was confirmed by the U.S. Senate in a voice vote on August 3, 2017.</p>

<p>The first woman elected to represent Texas in the U.S. Senate, Kay Bailey Hutchison worked on a wide range of issues, from transportation to health care, during her two decades in Congress. In 2000 Hutchison’s GOP colleagues elected her vice chair of the Senate Republican Conference—making her the fifth-ranking member of the party leadership—and the first woman since 1973 to hold a Republican leadership role in the Senate. “One of my obstacles has been attempts to trivialize me or underestimate me,” Hutchison said in 2000, noting that she had been stereotyped as a “quintessential, perennial cheerleader.” She eventually rose to the fourth-ranking position in the conference as the Policy Committee Chairwoman.</p>

<p>Kay Bailey Hutchison was born Kathryn Ann (Kay) Bailey in Galveston, Texas, on July 22, 1943, to Allan and Kathryn Bailey. She graduated from the University of Texas at Austin in 1962. She earned an LLB from the University of Texas School of Law in 1967 but was unable to find employment because law firms discriminated against women attorneys. “I just hit the brick wall,” Hutchison recalled. “I mean, I couldn’t get a job. Law firms didn’t hire women. I had a number of interviews, but they were all very disappointing. And so I began to think about looking for something other than a law firm.” She began a career as a Houston television reporter covering state politics. In 2001, after 20 years of marriage to attorney Ray Hutchison, the couple adopted two children: Bailey and Houston.</p>

<p>As a journalist, Hutchison had been inspired after an interview with Anne Armstrong, the Republican National Committee co-chair, to enter politics by first working as Armstrong’s press secretary. In 1972 Hutchison was elected to the Texas state house of representatives, where she cosponsored one of the nation’s first laws to protect the victims of rape. “The bill that we wrote and fought very hard to pass, and finally did pass” she recalled, “became the model for the nation in treatment of rape victims. Four years later, she left the state legislature to serve as vice chair of the National Transportation Safety Board. After four years in that post, Hutchison returned to Texas. In 1982 she made an unsuccessful bid for an open U.S. House seat representing portions of Dallas. She spent eight years in the private sector as a banking executive and as owner of a candy manufacturing company before winning election in 1990 as Texas state treasurer. As treasurer, Hutchison increased returns on state investments to $1 billion annually, led a successful campaign against a state income tax, and helped cap Texas’s state debt. Two years later, Hutchison co-chaired the Republican National Convention, held in Houston, Texas.</p>