Nancy Mace

Nancy Mace was married to Chris Niemiec, a lawyer and U.S. Air Force Reserve JAG Corps officer, from 1999 to 2002. She married Curtis Jackson in 2004, and they had two children before divorcing in 2019.

Mace became engaged to Patrick Bryant in 2022, but the engagement ended in 2023. She is a non-denominational Christian and has attended Seacoast Church in South Carolina.

Mace was raised in South Carolina's Lowcountry by James Emory Mace, a retired Army general, and Anne Mace, a retired schoolteacher. She left high school at 17 and began working as a waitress at a Waffle House in Ladson. She later obtained her high school diploma through college courses at Trident Technical College in North Charleston.

In 1999, Mace graduated magna cum laude from The Citadel and became the first woman to graduate from its Corps of Cadets program. She wrote about the experience in In the Company of Men: A Woman at The Citadel, published by Simon & Schuster in 2001. In 2004, she earned a master's degree in journalism and mass communication from the University of Georgia.

Before holding elected office, Mace worked in public relations and consulting. She began working for FITSNews in 2007, later became a co-owner, and sold her stake in 2013. The website covers South Carolina politics and current events.

Mace founded the Mace Group in 2008. The company has worked in technology, public relations and marketing, and commercial real estate.

Mace volunteered for Ron Paul's 2012 presidential campaign and ran for the Republican nomination for U.S. Senate in South Carolina in 2014. She later worked as a coalitions director and field director for Donald Trump's 2016 presidential campaign.

In 2017, Mace won a special-election Republican primary and runoff for South Carolina House District 99. She defeated Democrat Cindy Boatwright in the general election and served in the South Carolina House from January 2018 through November 2020.

As a state representative, she advocated for exceptions for rape and incest in South Carolina's six-week abortion ban and supported legislation opposing offshore drilling along the state's coast. In 2020, Governor Henry McMaster signed her prison reform bill ending the shackling of pregnant women in prison.

Mace won election to the U.S. House in 2020 by defeating incumbent Democrat Joe Cunningham and took office in January 2021. She won reelection in 2022 and 2024, becoming the first Republican woman elected to Congress from South Carolina.

Her congressional work has included legislation on cybersecurity, animal welfare, cannabis regulation, veterans' access to contraception, and protection of coastal interests. The Quantum Computing Cybersecurity Preparedness Act and the Human Trafficking Prevention Act of 2022 were among the bills she identified as having been signed into law. She also introduced the States Reform Act, which would remove cannabis from the federal Controlled Substances Act and regulate it similarly to alcohol.

Mace serves on the House Armed Services, Oversight and Accountability, and Veterans' Affairs committees. As chairwoman of the House Subcommittee on Cybersecurity, Information Technology, and Government Innovation, she led hearings on unidentified anomalous phenomena and government transparency, including questioning former intelligence official David Grusch in 2023.

Mace identifies as a conservative Republican, with positions that have included opposition to tax increases and government spending, support for limits on abortion with exceptions for rape, incest, and the life of the mother, and opposition to offshore drilling near South Carolina. She has also supported animal-welfare measures, including legislation restricting painful federally funded experiments on dogs and cats.

Her political career has included public breaks with members of her own party. She criticized Donald Trump's role in the January 6 attack on the Capitol but voted against impeaching him and endorsed him in the 2024 Republican presidential primary. In 2023, she voted to remove Kevin McCarthy as speaker of the House. In 2026, she ran unsuccessfully in the Republican primary for governor of South Carolina.