Rep. Nancy Mace (R-SC) told CNN anchor Jake Tapper that the Republican Party would “suffer in 2024” if it continued to focus on banning abortion at six weeks, during an appearance on The Lead, Wednesday.
Responding to a South Carolina bill that seeks to ban abortion at six weeks, with exceptions for incest and rape only if a police report or restraining order can be shown, Mace said, “I have grave concerns as a rape victim about the reporting requirements for rape victims within this legislation.”
“One of the things that we have to do is show compassion to women who have been raped and girls who are victims of incest, and requiring reporting of their rapes to law enforcement doesn’t do that,” she said, claiming that the “last thing you want to do as a victim of rape is to relive the rape that you’ve had by having to report it to police.”
“I can tell you I was horrified to tell my mother. It took me seven days to tell her what happened to me and I was a wreck,” Mace continued. “And when I dropped out of school, I was suicidal for months afterwards. It was a horrific experience.”
The congresswoman also said that when stories of rape “come into the media, once those reports have been made public, those women are dragged through the mud” and their
Asked by Tapper whether her party would “face any sort of electoral blowback for these bans” or “suffer in the polls,” Mace replied, “We suffered in 2022 and I do believe we’ll suffer in 2024 if we don’t have a message that shows compassion to women, both for women’s rights and the right to life. You can balance the two.”
“I would garner that if you were to do a ballot referendum on abortion in a conservative state like South Carolina, the majority of voters would not be supportive of a six-week ban that allowed very few exceptions for a very short period of time and required women to have their rapes reported to police,” Mace argued, adding, “That’s really not going to fly with most people, whether they’re men or women.”
“I saw this in my own district, in a very purple district last year. I saw how the issue swayed voters. It was the number two issue in our race,” she concluded.
Watch above via CNN.