lee made her debut in the political arena on the 2011 general election where she was fielded as a candidate representing the punggol east smc (a ward formerly part of the neighbouring pasir ris-punggol grc), where she was defeated to the governing people's action party (pap) candidate, michael palmer (who was made as a speaker of parliament post-election), with 16,994 (54.54%) to 12,777 votes (41.01%) (a third candidate, desmond lim of the singapore democratic alliance (sda), received only 1,387 votes (4.45%)).