? The most prominent Republican elected official in Kansas to publicly oppose the re-election of GOP Sen. Pat Roberts and Gov. Sam Brownback said Tuesday that she’s backing their challengers to push her party back toward the political center.

Retiring Insurance Commissioner Sandy Praeger grew up in a Republican family in eastern Kansas and repeatedly dismissed the idea that she might change her party affiliation as the state GOP moves to the right on issues such as abortion, health care, taxes and the budget. But she recently appeared in a television ad for independent Senate candidate Greg Orman, and hers was the biggest name among about 100 mostly former GOP officials endorsing Democratic challenger Paul Davis in the governor’s race in July.

She also endorsed Democrat Dennis Anderson in the insurance commissioner’s race after deciding not to seek a fourth, four-year term. And she speaks positively of former state Sen. Jean Schodorf, the Democrat trying to unseat conservative Republican Secretary of State Kris Kobach.

Praeger made a name for herself as perhaps the only prominent Republican in Kansas to express support for the federal health care overhaul championed by Democratic President Barack Obama. She said that winning a GOP primary this year would have been difficult because of her views on health care.

Yet Praeger, who turned 70 on Tuesday, said she’s not breaking with the political faith she learned from a grandmother who started a used furniture shop in Paola during the Great Depression.

“What I want is to stop the shift to the right and bring the Republican Party back to be a party of common sense and a party that’s willing to work across the aisle to solve problems instead of being so entrenched,” Praeger said during an Associated Press interview.

Praeger is a former Lawrence mayor who served 12 years in the Legislature before winning her first election as insurance commissioner in 2002. Despite her electoral successes, Clay Barker, the state GOP’s executive director, said he doubts her endorsements will carry much weight, particularly given her stance on health care in a state where Obama remains unpopular.

“The core issue is that she is the standard-bearer for Obamacare in Kansas,” Barker said.

But Bob Beatty, a political science professor at Washburn University in Topeka, said Praeger’s status as a statewide elected official means that her backing could help.

“She’s a classic moderate Republican,” Beatty said.

Praeger said Republican primary races in 2012 helped shape her endorsements this year. Brownback’s conservative allies ousted nine incumbent GOP state senators, and Praeger had served with five of them. Most are now part of a group of GOP dissidents backing Davis.

“I thought, if I stay out of it, I’ll feel like I’m being dishonest with my own personal beliefs,” Praeger said.