Nancy Mace
Nancy Ruth Mace is an American politician serving as the U.S. representative for South Carolina's 1st congressional district since 2021. A member of the Republican Party, she previously served in the South Carolina General Assembly from 2018 to 2020. The congressional district she represents comprises a six-county area in the southern portion of the state.
In 1999, Mace became the first woman to graduate from the Corps of Cadets program at the Citadel Military College of South Carolina, which was led at the time by her father, Emory Mace, the commandant of cadets. 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, defeating incumbent Democrat Joe Cunningham and becoming the first Republican woman elected to Congress from South Carolina. She was re-elected in 2022 and 2024. In August 2025, Mace announced her candidacy for Governor of South Carolina in 2026.
Early life and education
Mace was born at Fort Bragg, North Carolina, to United States Army brigadier general James Emory Mace and schoolteacher Anne Mace. Her father served as commandant of cadets at the Citadel from 1997 to 2005.In 1999, she became the first woman to graduate from the Citadel's Corps of Cadets program, earning a degree in business administration magna cum laude. She wrote In the Company of Men: A Woman at The Citadel about the experience.
In 2004, she earned 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, she founded the Mace Group, a public relations and consulting firm.
She became co-owner of the website FITSNews, which she had begun working for in 2007, and then sold her stake in 2013. The site covers South Carolina politics and current events.
Early political career
In 2012, Mace volunteered for the campaign of presidential candidate Ron Paul.In August 2013, she announced her candidacy in the 2014 election for the Republican nomination for U.S. Senate in South Carolina. She received 19,560 votes in the primary election on June 10, 2014, behind Lindsey Graham, Lee Bright, Richard Cash, and Det Bowers.
She supported Donald Trump for president in 2016 as a coalitions director and field director for the campaign.
South Carolina House of Representatives
Elections
2017 special
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, with 2,066 votes to 1,587. She took office on January 23, 2018.
2018
Mace defeated the Democratic nominee, Mount Pleasant resident Jen Gibson, in the November 6, 2018, general election.Tenure
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 into law Mace's prison reform bill, which ends the shackling of pregnant women in prison.
U.S. House of Representatives
Elections
2020
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 claimed Joe Cunningham was seeking trans equality in the Marine Corps which she claimed would shut down Marine Corps Recruit Depot Parris Island.
In the November general election, Mace defeated Cunningham. She assumed office on January 3, 2021.
2022
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.
2024
Mace ran for a third term and defeated Democratic candidate Michael B. Moore in the general election.Tenure
Relationship to Donald Trump
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 pleaded 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. She would later come to Trump's defense after he was indicted for mishandling classified documents.
In 2024, Mace endorsed Trump in the 2024 Republican primaries over Nikki Haley, who supported Mace in the 2022 primary.
Relationship to other lawmakers
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. Following his ouster, Mace took to media, describing him as "a loser" who was "bored and doesn't know what to do with himself." Mace stated that she had never liked McCarthy since she joined Congress, baffling district Republicans who questioned why she had turned on her ally. Berkeley County Republican Party chair Victoria Cowart said "one of the sentiments I get the most is that she's talking out of both sides of her mouth."
On October 30, 2025, Mace was involved in an incident with law enforcement at Charleston International Airport in South Carolina, after the Charleston County Aviation Authority were late to meet her to escort her to her flight. She commented "Fucking incompetent" repeatedly and "this is no way to treat a fucking U.S. Representative". Mace's team claimed this was due to a concern for lax security and the representative's safety. Mace continued to accuse the airport security of "lies" after the incident. During the outburst, Mace commented that they "would never treat Tim Scott like this", which prompted senator Tim Scott and senator Lindsey Graham to publicly denounce Mace for her behavior.
Legislation
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.On October 2, 2023, the House of Representatives passed a cybersecurity bill titled the MACE Act, intended to modernize federal cybersecurity job requirements. The bill was introduced by Mace and would be the last bill passed under Speaker Kevin McCarthy. Mace's legislative staff named the bill after her as a joke about Mace's ego.
In April 2024, Mace introduced the Preventing Animal Abuse and Waste Act. The bill "prevents the National Institute of Health from conducting or supporting any research that causes significant pain and distress to dogs and cats." It also "requires reports to Congress by the NIH and Government Accountability Office detailing NIH-funded dog and cat experiments, their cost and assessments of NIH efforts to phase them out."
In 2025, Mace was among a handful of Republican lawmakers to sign a petition calling for a vote on the release of the Epstein files. Mace, a survivor of rape and sexual abuse, wrote on social media that "the Epstein petition is deeply personal."