Political Career
While a student at Mills College, she was a volunteer at the Oakland chapter of the Black Panther Party's Community Learning Center and worked on Panther co-founder Bobby Seale's 1973 Oakland mayoral campaign. Lee was a staff member for United States Representative Ron Dellums and a member of the California State Assembly and the California State Senate before entering the House. As a staffer to Representative Dellums, she traveled to Grenada to have the government there vet the report Representative Dellums planned to present to Congress. In the report Representative Dellums planned to state that the airport would not pose a military threat to United States national security. As noted in Destructive Generation: Second Thoughts About the '60 on page 163, "Another document retrieved after Grenada's liberation provided he postscript. In a diary entry dated March 22, 1980, Grenadian Defense Minister Liam James had written: "The Revo has been able to crush counter revolution internationally. Airport will be used by Cuban and Soviet military."" She ran for Congress in a special election that created a year-long series of five special elections as various East Bay politicians vied for political office. (For a detailed account of these elections, see Special election musical chairs.)
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