Influential former Texas US Rep. Eddie Bernice Johnson dies at 89

DALLAS, Texas (AP) — Trailblazing former U.S. Rep. Eddie Bernice Johnson has died at 89. The nurse from Texas helped bring hundreds of millions of federal dollars to the Dallas area as the region’s most powerful Democrat. She died Sunday. Dallas Mayor Eric Johnson said in a statement that she was the “single most effective legislator Dallas has ever had.” Eddie Bernice Johnson served in the House for three decades after becoming the first registered nurse elected to Congress and first Black chief psychiatric nurse at Dallas’ Veterans Affairs hospital. She went on to become the first Black woman to chair the House Committee on Science, Space, and Technology.