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American politician (born 1977)

Nancy Ruth Mace (born December 4, 1977) is an American politician who has been the U. S. representative for South Carolina's 1st congressional district since 2021. Her district includes much of the state's share of the East Coast, from Charleston to Hilton Head Island. In 1999, Mace became the first woman to graduate from the Corps of Cadets program at The Citadel. From 2018 to 2020, she represented the 99th district in the South Carolina House of Representatives, covering Hanahan, northeast Mount Pleasant, and Daniel Island. In 2020, Mace was elected to the U. S. House of Representatives, becoming the first Republican woman elected to Congress from South Carolina. Mace worked for Donald Trump's 2016 presidential campaign, but strongly condemned his actions surrounding the January 6 U. S. Capitol attack. Mace asserted that Trump's legacy had been "wiped out" and that he should be held "accountable" for his actions. However, she ultimately voted against impeaching him. In her 2022 re election campaign, Mace fended off a Trump back primary challenger. Within a year, Mace would change her rhetoric, later coming to Trump's defense following his criminal indictment. In 2024, Mace endorsed Trump in the 2024 Republican primaries over Nikki Haley, who supported Mace in the 2022 primary.

Mace was born at Fort Liberty, North Carolina, to United States Army officer James Emory Mace and schoolteacher Anne Mace. receiving a degree in business administration. Mace wrote In the Company of Men: A Woman at The Citadel (Simon & Schuster, 2001) about the experience. Mace went on to earn a master's degree in journalism and mass communication from the Henry W. Grady College of Journalism and Mass Communication at the University of Georgia. In 2008, Mace started a public relations and consulting firm called The Mace Group. Mace became co owner of the website FITSNews, which she began working for in 2007, but sold her stake in 2013. The site covers South Carolina politics and current events.

In 2012, Mace volunteered for the campaign of presidential candidate Ron Paul. In August 2013, Mace announced her candidacy in the 2014 election for the Republican nomination for U. S. Senate in South Carolina. She received 19,560 votes (6.2% of the vote) in the primary election on June 10, 2014, behind Lindsey Graham (56.4%), Lee Bright (15.4%), Richard Cash (8.3%), and Det Bowers (7.3%). Mace supported Donald Trump for president in 2016 as a coalitions director and field director for the campaign.

On September 18, 2017, Mace filed as a Republican to run in a special election for the South Carolina State House District 99 seat being vacated by Jimmy Merrill, who resigned earlier that month after an indictment and plea deal for several ethics violations. She received 49.5% of the vote in the November 14 Republican primary, 13 votes short of winning the nomination outright. She defeated the second place finisher, Mount Pleasant town councilman Mark Smith, in the November 28 runoff, 63–37%. Mace defeated Democrat Cindy Boatwright in the January 16, 2018, general election, 2,066 votes to 1,587 (57–43%). She took office on January 23, 2018.

Mace defeated the Democratic nominee, Mount Pleasant resident Jen Gibson, in the November 6, 2018 general election.

In 2019, Mace successfully advocated for the inclusion of exceptions for rape and incest in a bill for a six week abortion ban that passed the South Carolina state house. In a speech on the state house floor, Mace revealed that she had been raped at age 16. She has said she opposes abortion but does not believe the government has the right to deny the procedure to a victim of rape or incest. Mace co sponsored a bill to oppose offshore drilling off South Carolina's coast. She opposed President Donald Trump's plan to offer oil drilling leases off South Carolina beaches. The Conservation Voters of South Carolina gave Mace a 100% Lifetime rating for her voting record against offshore drilling and seismic testing. The South Carolina Club for Growth gave Mace its 2019 Tax Payer Hero Award. In May 2020, Governor Henry McMaster signed Mace's prison reform bill, which ends the shackling of pregnant women in prison, into law.

In June 2019, Mace announced that she would seek the Republican nomination for South Carolina's 1st congressional district, centered in Charleston, and at the time represented by Democrat Joe Cunningham. Cunningham won the seat in 2018 in a surprise victory, winning a district Trump had carried by 13 percentage points two years earlier. Mace faced Mount Pleasant City Councilwoman Kathy Landing and Bikers for Trump founder Chris Cox in the June 9 Republican primary. During her primary campaign, she ran an advertisement stating she would "help President Trump take care of our veterans", and in which Vice President Mike Pence called her "an extraordinary American with an extraordinary lifetime of accomplishments—past, present and future." She won the primary with 57.5% of the vote. Mace focused her campaign on banning offshore drilling off South Carolina's coast and restoring South Carolina's low country's economy.

Mace did not vote to impeach President Trump, but she criticized him for his role in the January 6, 2021 attack on the U. S. Capitol. As a consequence, Trump endorsed former South Carolina representative Katie Arrington in the 2022 Republican primary for Mace's congressional seat. Mace defeated Arrington. In the November general election, Mace defeated Democratic nominee Annie Andrews by 14 percentage points.

Mace was one of seven Republicans who publicly refused to support their colleagues' efforts to challenge the results of the 2020 presidential election on January 6, 2021. These seven signed a letter that, while giving credence to Trump's allegations of electoral fraud, said Congress did not have the authority to influence the election's outcome. Mace was so concerned by the hostile atmosphere Trump was generating in the District of Columbia that she sent her children home to South Carolina before the congressional vote to accept the Electoral College votes. After the 2021 United States Capitol attack, Mace pled with Trump to condemn it. While locked down in her Capitol office she told CBS News' Red & Blue host Elaine Quijano, "I'm begging the president to get off Twitter." Ultimately Mace voted against impeaching Trump, however, stating that due process had not been properly followed. Mace, along with all other Senate and House Republicans, voted against the American Rescue Plan Act of 2021. On May 18, 2021, Mace joined 61 other House Republicans to vote against the COVID 19 Hate Crimes Act, which condemned acts of hate against Asian Americans and streamlined data collection and reporting about such occurrences. The bill previously passed the U. S. Senate on a 94–1 vote. Mace said she opposed the bill because it did not address discrimination against Asian Americans in higher education. In November 2021, Mace criticized fellow Republican Congresswoman Lauren Boebert for her anti Muslim comments about Democrat Ilhan Omar. On October 3, 2023, Mace voted in favor of removing Kevin McCarthy, a fellow Republican, from his position as speaker of the House. According to Mace, "McCarthy did not follow through on pushing her legislation to address the country’s rape kit backlog, expand access to birth control, adopt a balanced budget amendment and create an alert system that would notify people when there is a mass shooting". McCarthy, who had been a strong ally of Mace's, denied her claims.

Mace's congressional district was redrawn thanks to a "stark racial gerrymander" intended to suppress the power of Black voters, according to a three judge federal panel. Her new district shifted 62%, 30,000 of Charleston's Black voters, from Mace's former swing district into that of Jim Clyburn, a Black Democrat who has held his District 6 seat for 30 years, while incorporating inland white voters into Mace's now solidly conservative district.

Mace has supported efforts to ban abortion, except in cases of rape, incest or threats to the life of the mother. In 2021, Mace cosponsored the Life at Conception Act, which would recognize a fertilized egg as a person with equal protections under the 14th Amendment and establish a nationwide abortion ban. On January 26, 2023, Mace introduced the Standing with Moms Act, which would create a website, life. gov, that would link women to crisis pregnancy centers (non profits established by anti abortion groups primarily to persuade pregnant women not to have an abortion). In 2021, Mace was one of 26 Republicans to vote for the Equal Access to Contraception for Veterans Act. In 2021, Mace was among a handful of Republican representatives who did not sign onto an amicus brief to overturn Roe v. Wade. She criticized states enacting abortion bans without exceptions in the wake of the Supreme Court overturning Roe v. Wade in 2022. In an interview on Face the Nation, she said she disagreed with the recently passed abortion ban in Florida, which was signed into law by Governor Ron DeSantis: "Signing a six week ban that puts women who are victims of rape and girls who are victims of incest and in a hard spot isn't the way to change hearts and minds. It's not compassionate. The requirements [DeSantis] has for rape victims are too much, not something that I support. It's a non starter. I am a victim of rape. I was raped by a classmate at the age of 16. I am very wary, and the devil is always in the details, but we've got to show more care and concern and compassion for women who've been raped. I don't like that this bill was signed in the dead of night".

In June 2021, Mace was one of 49 House Republicans to vote to repeal the Authorization for Use of Military Force Against Iraq Resolution of 2002. During the 2021–2022 Russo Ukrainian crisis, Mace wrote an article opposing military intervention in the conflict. Mace voted for H. R. 7691, the Additional Ukraine Supplemental Appropriations Act, 2022, which would provide $40 billion in emergency aid to the Ukrainian government. However, she voted against Ukraine aid the following year. In 2023, Mace was among 47 Republicans to vote in favor of H. Con. Res. 21, which directed President Joe Biden to remove U. S. troops from Syria within 180 days. In 2023, Mace was among 52 Republicans who voted in favor H. Con. Res. 30, which would remove American troops from Somalia. In 2023, Mace voted for a ban on a Center of Excellence in Ukraine that enhances NATO activities.

In 2021, the Washington Examiner wrote that Mace "is a supporter of both religious liberty and gay marriage." Later that year, she told the Examiner, "I strongly support LGBTQ rights and equality. No one should be discriminated against." She opposed the Equality Act, instead co sponsoring a Republican alternative called the Fairness for All Act. Mace was one of 31 Republicans to vote for the LGBTQ Business Equal Credit Enforcement and Investment Act. Mace was the lone Republican to sponsor H. R.5776 Serving Our LGBTQ Veterans Act, legislation establishing a Center for Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, Transgender, and Queer (LGBTQ) Veterans within the Department of Veterans Affairs. Among other functions, the center must serve as the department's principal adviser on adoption and implementation of policies and programs affecting veterans who are LGBTQ. In July 2022, Mace was among 47 Republican representatives who voted in favor of the Respect for Marriage Act, which protects existing same sex and interracial marriages under federal law. She later said, "If gay couples want to be as happily or miserably married as straight couples, more power to them. Trust me, I've tried it more than once."

In 2021, Mace introduced the States Reform Act to remove cannabis from the Controlled Substances Act and regulate it similarly to alcohol. She said: "This bill supports veterans, law enforcement, farmers, businesses, those with serious illnesses, and it is good for criminal justice reform. The States Reform Act takes special care to keep Americans and their children safe while ending federal interference with state cannabis laws."

Mace opposed the first attempt to remove Liz Cheney as chair of the House Republican Conference, saying, "We should not be silencing voices of dissent. That is one of the reasons we are in this today, is that we have allowed QAnon conspiracy theorists to lead us." In early May, Mace appeared at fundraiser events with Cheney. During the second attempt to remove Cheney as chair, however, Mace voted to remove her.

On October 21, 2021, Mace was one of nine House Republicans who voted to hold Steve Bannon in contempt of Congress for defying a subpoena to appear before the United States House Select Committee on the January 6 Attack. Explaining her vote, Mace said she was being "consistent" and wanted to retain the exercise of "the power to subpoena" in the event that Republicans regained control of the House of Representatives in 2022.

On May 31, 2023, Mace was among 71 House Republicans who voted against final passage of the Fiscal Responsibility Act of 2023 to raise the debt ceiling. Mace was one of three Republican members of the Problem Solvers Caucus who voted against raising the debt ceiling that day. Two days later she appeared on Steve Bannon's podcast to claim, "the American people were spoon fed a bed of lies" regarding the measure.

In April 2021, Mace voiced her opposition to a Democratic proposal to grant the District of Columbia statehood. She argued that D. C. was too small to qualify as a state, saying, "D. C. wouldn't even qualify as a singular congressional district." She made this statement alongside Liz Cheney who represented Wyoming's at large congressional district, which has a smaller population than D. C.

During her 2014 U. S. Senate campaign, Mace said "We must use any means possible to repeal, defund, and ultimately stop Obamacare" because it will "suffocate individual liberty and further stifle economic growth". After they divorced, Mace married Curtis Jackson, with whom she had two children. They divorced in 2019. Mace became engaged to Patrick Bryant in 2022 but the couple broke up in 2023. Mace resides on Daniel Island in Charleston, South Carolina. On June 1, 2021, the Charleston Police Department opened an investigation after Mace's home was vandalized with profanity, three anarchy symbols, and graffiti in support of the PRO Act. Mace is a practicing Protestant.