Spain lost a political pioneer on April 9, when former defense minister Carme Chacón died at age 46 from an apparent congenital heart condition.
When Chacón became Spain’s first female defense minister in 2008, she was 37 years old and seven months pregnant.
Her appointment to the position following a stint as housing minister prompted intense criticism. Opponents saw it as an insult to the armed forces since she was trained as a lawyer and had no military experience, according to Quartz. But others considered her a capable, compassionate leader and a symbol of gender equality, thriving in the nation’s notoriously macho culture and dismantling stereotypes of pregnant women.
A 2008 image of Chacón—visibly pregnant in a white blouse, walking amid troops as they stand at attention—became an iconic portrait of the country at a time when Prime Minister José Luis Rodríguez Zapatero had guaranteed balanced political representation and had vowed to push through sexual equality laws.
After Chacón’s Socialist party was voted out of power in the 2011 election, she lost a close race to be its leader. At the news of her death, tributes to the former army commander poured in, including from Spain’s current deputy prime minister Soraya Sáenz de Santamaría. She said Chacón, who is survived by her son Miguel, “opened the door for many.”