Katherine O'Connell (née Newman; born 3 January 1980) is an Irish former Fine Gael politician who served as a Teachta Dála (TD) for the Dublin Bay South constituency from 2016 to 2020.

O'Connell also suggested many local Fine Gael branch members in Dublin South Bay regarded her as an outsider and a "parachute candidate" due to the fact she is originally from County Westmeath, and had turned against her over this.

[14][15] The Phoenix offered the view that O'Connell would not be nominated because she had turned the Fine Gael leadership against her while lobbying for her sister Mary Newman Julian to be the party's candidate in a 2018 Seanad by-election.

[20] In October 2024, O'Connell left Fine Gael to contest the next general election in Dublin Bay South as an independent candidate.

[28] The Phoenix has referred to O'Connell as Fine Gael's "most prominent Feminist" and praised her for not shrinking away from difficult debates in the Dáil over abortion.

[16] The Phoenix has also suggested that while O'Connell's outspokenness was praised by Fine Gael members when directed at opponents, equally she has caused internal discontent whenever she turned her criticisms inward, leading to her alienation from certain factions in the party.

[29] In 2018 O'Connell was on the forefront of Fine Gael's campaign to secure a Yes vote in that year's referendum on the repeal of the 8th amendment, the piece of the Irish constitution which forbade abortion.

[3][16][13] It was also in 2018 that O'Connell expressed the views that tax should be removed from the sale of condoms, that free contraception should be made available to women, that cannabis should be legalised and that Ireland should move to the eventual decriminalisation of all drugs.

McCarthy opined that Irish politics needed more, not fewer politicians like O'Connell, and that McGuirk was a hypocrite for not levelling his same criticisms at male members of Fine Gael.

[33] O'Connell has stated that growing up, she and her family were greatly influenced by the progressive politics of Fine Gael leader Garret FitzGerald.