FACTBOX: Massachusetts primary winner Martha Coakley

(Reuters) - Massachusetts state Attorney General Martha Coakley on Tuesday won the Democratic primary for the U.S. Senate seat left vacant by the death of Senator Edward Kennedy in August.

Coakley, 56, is now heavily favored to win the general election on January 19 against Scott Brown, who won the Republican primary.

Massachusetts has not sent a Republican to the U.S. Senate in almost 40 years.

Coakley would become the first woman to represent Massachusetts in the Senate, and would serve out the remainder of Kennedy's term, which runs through 2012.

If elected, she is expected to be a reliable vote for President Barack Obama's push for healthcare reform -- Kennedy's signature issue.

She supports a public insurance option as a way to reduce healthcare costs. However, Coakley, who calls herself "a steadfast champion of Roe v. Wade," has suggested she will not vote for a healthcare bill that significantly limits access to abortion.

Coakley came out in November against increasing U.S. troop levels in Afghanistan.

Elected state attorney general in November 2006, she became the first woman to serve in that office.

In July 2009, she filed a suit that challenged the federal Defense of Marriage Act, making Massachusetts the only state so far to challenge the legislation that bans same-sex marriage.

While serving as district attorney of Middlesex County between 1999 and 2007, Coakley defended legislation to expand buffer zones around reproductive healthcare facilities.

This year, she won settlements of $60 million from Goldman Sachs and $10 million from Fremont Investment & Loan for their abuse of subprime mortgages and lending.

In the run-up to Tuesday's election, she received the endorsement of former President Bill Clinton.

During a relatively uneventful campaign for Kennedy's seat, she raised eyebrows by acknowledging that she had overlooked more than $200,000 in savings and mistakenly claimed to have no personal assets in a financial disclosure required of candidates.

Coakley received a BA from Williams College in 1975 and graduated from Boston University School of Law in 1979. (Reporting by Ros Krasny in Boston; editing by Chris Wilson)