Former Rep. Mary Rose Oakar, the first Arab American woman in Congress and a political casualty of the 1992 House banking scandal, died on Sept. 13 in Lakewood, Ohio. She was 85.
A Democrat from Cleveland’s West Side, Oakar was first elected to the House in 1976 and served eight terms, winning easily each time before losing to Republican Martin R. Hoke in 1992. That year, she faced a redrawn district and was swept into the banking scandal, having written more than 200 bounced checks.
In the House, Oakar championed women’s rights and economic equality, including pay equity bills. She managed to restore a Medicare mammogram benefit after it was repealed, partly by convincing then-Ways and Means Chairman Dan Rostenkowski to decry the repeal as loudly as she did, according to her 1992 Almanac of American Politics profile. She also introduced an ultimately successful bill to create the $1 coin featuring pioneering suffragist Susan B. Anthony.
