Michelle Steel Campaign Aims to Revive Orange County GOP

Michelle Steel is a different kind of House candidate. For thirty years, Dana Rohrabacher was a mainstay of the California state GOP. A speechwriter and special assistant to President Reagan, Rohrabacher served as the congressman for California’s 48th district from 1989 until 2018, when he was beaten by Democrat Harley Rouda amid the blue wave that helped Democrats retake the House and wiped Republicans out in the cradle of West Coast conservatism, Orange County.

At first glance, Steel — the chair of the Orange County Board of Supervisors and wife of Shawn Steel, a former chair of the California Republican Party who presently serves on the RNC’s Executive Committee — may appear to be an unremarkable political insider who has been preparing to run for Congress her whole life. But Steel’s story and candidacy are worth more than a glance. Born in Seoul, Steel moved to Japan at 14, when her father was sent there as a diplomat. She later moved to the United States to better learn English — it’s her third language, after Korean and Japanese — and attend college. Steel graduated with a business degree from Pepperdine before going on to earn an MBA from the University of Southern California. Her family followed her to the U.S. after her father passed away.

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Isaac Schorr

Isaac Schorr is an editor at Mediaite and a 2023–2024 Robert Novak Journalism Fellow at the Fund for American Studies.

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Michelle Steel is a different kind of House candidate. For thirty years, Dana Rohrabacher was a mainstay of the California state GOP. A speechwriter and special assistant to President Reagan, Rohrabacher served as the congressman for California’s 48th district from 1989 until 2018, when he was beaten by Democrat Harley Rouda amid the blue wave that helped Democrats retake the House and wiped Republicans out in the cradle of West Coast conservatism, Orange County.

At first glance, Steel — the chair of the Orange County Board of Supervisors and wife of Shawn Steel, a former chair of the California Republican Party who presently serves on the RNC’s Executive Committee — may appear to be an unremarkable political insider who has been preparing to run for Congress her whole life. But Steel’s story and candidacy are worth more than a glance. Born in Seoul, Steel moved to Japan at 14, when her father was sent there as a diplomat. She later moved to the United States to better learn English — it’s her third language, after Korean and Japanese — and attend college. Steel graduated with a business degree from Pepperdine before going on to earn an MBA from the University of Southern California. Her family followed her to the U.S. after her father passed away.