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Dispatch

The House rejects Mace's bid to release unproven harassment records, 357-65

On March 4, 2026, the House voted 357-65 to reject Rep. Nancy Mace's resolution directing the Ethics Committee to publicly release its records of alleged member sexual misconduct, including allegations the Committee had never substantiated. The bipartisan objection was about due process: Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez said the measure was rushed and could expose both the accused and victims to the release of unproven claims, and the Ethics Committee warned it would chill victim cooperation. The lopsided vote made it the rare Mace women's-safety measure that even most of her own party would not support as written.

On March 4, 2026, the U.S. House of Representatives voted 357 to 65 to reject H.Res. 1100, a resolution sponsored by Rep. Nancy Mace that would have directed the House Ethics Committee to preserve and publicly release all of its records concerning alleged violations of the Code of Official Conduct involving sexual harassment or sexual assault by a member, delegate, or resident commissioner. A nine-day-earlier version, H.Res. 1072, had been superseded. The vote, recorded as a motion to refer, was the procedural equivalent of killing the measure, and it drew opposition from across the aisle.

What the resolution would have done

The resolution did not distinguish between substantiated and unsubstantiated matters. As written, it would have forced into public view the Ethics Committee's files on allegations the committee had reviewed but never proven, with no consent mechanism for the people named in them, accuser or accused. According to NBC News, the push was prompted by allegations against Rep. Tony Gonzales (R-TX).

The objection was due process

The criticism was not that sexual misconduct should stay hidden; it was that publishing unadjudicated accusations, by congressional fiat and without process, harms everyone the files touch.

  • Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-NY) argued the resolution was rushed and lacked due process: it would release records tied to false or unsubstantiated allegations with no mechanism for victim consent, and risked identifying victims even where names were nominally redacted, per NBC News.
  • The House Ethics Committee itself warned the proposal could "chill victim cooperation and witness participation" in future investigations, according to Axios.

A 357-65 result means the overwhelming majority of both parties, including most Republicans, declined to back the measure as drafted.

Why it belongs in the record

Most of Mace's women's-safety legislation is conventional victim-protection policy. H.Res. 1100 is the clearest instance of the opposite concern: a measure whose own design would have broadcast unproven accusations without due process, and which the House rejected for exactly that reason. It also lands against her own posted view of the protection. In June 2025 Mace wrote "Due process is for citizens," a claim X's Community Notes corrected and that contradicted her February 2023 statement that "everyone deserves the right to due process."

Sources & related coverage