Rep. Nancy Mace, R-S.C., says she is voting for GOP presidential candidate Donald Trump because she’s a woman and and he will protect women like herself “who are survivors of rape,” she said during a Fox News interview on Thursday, The Daily Beast reported.
The comment came after Mace was asked how she feels about “the whole gender thing” as a factor in this year’s election. The lawmaker reiterated her support for the former president, despite a jury finding Trump liable for raping writer E. Jean Carroll.
The South Carolina representative, a survivor of sexual assault herself, doubled down on why she would vote for Trump despite his record on women, listing policies that she found relevant: “lowering taxes for the middle class, expanding the child care tax credit, looking at the spending of the federal government” (Trump ran up the national debt twice as fast as President Joe Biden, per a recent analysis).
“I’m voting for Donald Trump because I want to be sure that biological men aren’t in the locker room showering next to my underage daughter,” she added. “I want to make sure men aren’t stealing women’s achievements in sports or academics or their scholarships, and that’s why, as a woman, I support Donald Trump.”
Mace’s comments — defending a man who has been publicly accused of sexual misconduct, including both groping and rape, by at least 25 other women in the last five decades — come after she clasehd with ABC’s “This Week” host George Stephanopoulos when he questioned her support for Trump after the E. Jean Carroll verdict.
Mace deflected by claiming Stephanopolous was shaming her as a survivor.
“I will tell you that I was raped at the age of 16, and any rape victim will tell you I’ve lived for 30 years with an incredible amount of shame,” she argued. “I didn’t come forward because of that judgment and shame that I felt, and it’s a shame that you will never feel, George, and I’m not going to sit here on your show and be asked a question meant to shame me about another potential rape victim. I’m not going to do that.”