Andrea Dew Steele is a social entrepreneur, political expert, and philanthropic leader. Her career started off in the political world where she worked on campaigns, Democratic committees, and in government in Washington, D.C., for many years.  She was wooed to the West Coast by noted philanthropist and democratic activist Susie Tompkins Buell, for whom she worked for 8 years as her Political and Philanthropic advisor.

During her time with Susie, she was struck by the incredible lack of women holding elected office at the local level in San Francisco and co-founded Emerge California in 2002 to lead the fight to get more Democratic women elected to office in Northern California. Andrea worked tirelessly to develop a top-notch training program, and in 2005 she founded Emerge America to replicate the model across the country. Emerge currently has affiliates in 27 states across the country with plans to expand in the future. Andrea continues to be a passionate advocate for increasing the number of Democratic women in elected office at every level and is motivated by a life-long commitment to progressive politics and change.

In addition to being fervent about electing Democratic women to office, she is also a human rights champion with a particular passion for criminal justice reform. She ran the Northern California office of Human Rights Watch (HRW) for several years and currently serves on the Northern California Committee for Human Rights Watch as well as the board of City Youth Now, a local organization dedicated to supporting at-risk youth.

Andrea holds a B.A. in Political Science from Tufts University and an M.A. in International History from the London School of Economics. 

When not helping candidates and causes, Andrea lives for the outdoors and can be found hiking, biking and playing tennis.