Seoul: Budget Minister nominee Lee Hye-hoon is a former three-term lawmaker affiliated with the opposition conservative bloc and is well-versed in budgetary and other economic issues. Lee has been nominated as the inaugural minister of the newly established Ministry of Planning and Budget, a testament to her extensive experience in economic matters.

According to Yonhap News Agency, Lee served three parliamentary terms from 2004 to 2024, during which she participated in the parliamentary finance and intelligence committees. Her political career began at the state-run Korea Development Institute, and she won her first parliamentary seat in Seoul's conservative-leaning Seocho district in 2004.

Following the ouster of former President Park Geun-hye in 2017, Lee left Park's Saenuri Party to lead the minor conservative Bareun Party. In September 2021, she joined the campaign of then-conservative presidential candidate Yoon Suk Yeol, serving as chair of the special committee for national future strategy. In the previous year's parliamentary elections, Lee ran unsuccessfully for a seat in the Jung-Seongdong district before serving as policy chief for conservative presidential candidate Kim Moon-soo in the April presidential election.

During her first two terms as a lawmaker, Lee was a member of the parliamentary Strategy and Finance Committee, and she later chaired the intelligence committee during her third term. Lee's academic background includes a bachelor's degree in economics from Seoul National University and a doctorate in economics from the University of California, Los Angeles.