For nearly 18 months, one of Washington’s most important embassies operated without a Senate-confirmed ambassador. With the confirmation According to former Republican Congresswoman Michelle Steel, the United States finally has an ambassador to South Korea.
His arrival in Seoul has considerable symbolic significance. As a Korean American, Steel reflects the deep human connections that have long complemented the military and strategic foundations of the South Korea-U.S. alliance. But symbolism can be both an asset and a liability.
Steel’s appointment comes at a time when political polarization has become a defining feature of U.S. and South Korean politics. Unlike many of her predecessors, she rose to her ambassadorship not as a career diplomat but as a politician whose public profile was shaped by the electoral struggle. Of course, many successful ambassadors come from politics rather than diplomacy. Yet Steel faces political risks that previous U.S. envoys to Seoul have encountered only to a limited extent. Ironically, some of these risks arise from the very qualities that give his appointment historical significance.
Steel is not the first Korean American to represent Washington in Seoul. Sung Kimwho served as ambassador from 2011 to 2014, also brought cultural familiarity and personal connections to the role. Yet Kim’s term in office took place in a very different political environment. He worked at a time when neither the United States nor South Korea was yet consumed by the ideological polarization that increasingly shapes both societies today. Kim’s legacy served above all as a bridge. Steel may discover that the same ethnic identity carries different expectations.
Unlike Sung Kim, a career diplomat with decades of experience whose Korean heritage stands largely apart from his professional identity, Steel arrives in Seoul with both an ethnic affinity and a distinctly partisan political brand. It is the combination of the two – not just one – that makes his mandate potentially more complicated.
The first challenge facing the new ambassador is the risk of becoming too politically familiar. Diplomats traditionally benefit from a certain distance. They represent the interests of their governments and not the passions of their host countries. Their authority depends in part on their ability to stay above domestic political battles. Still, Steel’s Korean heritage might encourage some South Koreans to view her less as Washington’s representative and more as someone with a special affinity for Korea itself.
Such feelings are understandable, but familiarity can create unrealistic expectations. Political actors often prefer to view foreign figures through the prism of their own domestic struggles. A Korean-American ambassador can easily be described as a “hometown figure” whose background involves sympathy for particular political causes. In other words, ethnic affinity can create pressure as well as goodwill.
Steel’s political profile also differs from that of previous ambassadors. During her congressional campaigns in California, she frequently underlines anti-communist themes and concerns about Chinese influence, messages that resonated with a portion of his district’s Asian American electorate. Critics argued that some of his campaign messages amplified concerns about Chinese influence for political purposes and resorted to racist attacks, while its supporters saw it as a legitimate response to growing concerns about China. Regardless of one’s position, these campaigns helped shape Steel’s public profile – one more associated with partisan politics than traditional diplomacy.
A second, perhaps more important, challenge is that of political ownership. In recent years, elements of the South Korean conservative movement have increasingly echoed themes and rhetoric familiar to American politics, including allegations of election fraud and concerns about the influence of the Chinese Communist Party.
Even before Steel’s arrival, some conservative commentators welcomed his appointment as proof that Washington was increasingly aligning with their worldview. His appointment was interpreted as a “warning to the Lee Jae Myung administration.” Such reactions reveal less about Steel’s situation itself than the temptation to treat American political identities as extensions of South Korea’s domestic conflicts.
The danger is that competing political camps project their own expectations onto it. Conservatives may view her as an ideological ally, while progressives may view her primarily through the prism of American partisan politics. Both interpretations would transform the ambassador from a diplomatic figure into a political symbol.
South Korea is not unique in this regard. As political identities and media become increasingly transnational, alliances themselves become more vulnerable to the passions of domestic politics.
Ordinary political disagreements are manageable. Washington and Seoul have clashed for decades over trade, burden-sharing, North Korea and China. Such disagreements are ultimately matters of policy, and policies can be negotiated. Symbolism and identity are more difficult to manage because they operate on emotion rather than strategic calculation.
This is what makes the comparison with Sung Kim particularly revealing. During his tenure, few South Koreans viewed him from an ideological perspective. He was an American diplomat of Korean origin. Today, however, ethnicity, ideology, and partisanship are increasingly intertwined. The challenge Michelle Steel faces is therefore less about diplomacy and more about perception. The same Korean heritage that once served primarily as a bridge now risks becoming a source of political contestation.
Seoul’s biggest steel challenge may not be China, North Korea or burden-sharing negotiations. His toughest task may be maintaining the political distance needed for diplomacy – and avoiding getting involved in South Korea’s domestic political battles.
Whether her historic appointment becomes another bridge between Washington and Seoul, or an unintentional symbol of polarization on both sides of the Pacific, will depend not only on the ambassador herself, but also on the political maturity of the two democracies.