Part of: The House Ethics reimbursement investigation (2025-2026) · House Ethics Committee Investigation of Rep. Nancy Mace (OCC Review 25-5681)
Rare Earth, Wellness, and Defense Tech: Nancy Mace's Post-Congress Wish List
Maceopedia ·
In the same breath she used to say she wants to "whittle sticks," Nancy Mace named the fields she plans to explore once she leaves Congress. Per South Carolina Public Radio's Maayan Schechter, those interests are:
rare earth minerals and metals, wellness and defense technology
The Armed Services Connection
Two of those three fields are shaped directly by the federal government Mace has spent six years helping to run. She currently sits on the House Armed Services Committee, where her subcommittee assignments include Seapower and Projection Forces, Intelligence and Special Operations, and Military Personnel, according to her own House committee page.
Rare earth minerals and "defense technology" are not neutral hobbies. Rare earths are a stated national-security priority tied to defense-industrial policy, and defense technology is procured through the same Pentagon budget that Armed Services members authorize each year. A member who votes on defense and industrial policy naming those exact sectors as her private-sector future is the textbook shape of what ethics watchdogs call the revolving door.
Maceopedia takes no position on whether any future venture would be improper. We are cataloging what she said, and noting the overlap between her committee work and her stated business interests.
The One-Year Clock
Mace cannot act on any of this yet. As she explained on the We The Palmetto podcast on August 13, members of Congress are barred from signing an employment contract until after they leave office:
"Members of Congress are not allowed to sign a contract for a gig or a job until after they've left Congress."
Federal law also imposes post-employment "cooling off" restrictions on former members who lobby. Her term ends in January 2027, which is when any rare-earth, wellness, or defense-tech move could formally begin.
Context
Mace did not seek re-election in 2026, running instead for governor and losing the June Republican primary. She has already stood up the GET MACED podcast as a media venture and told business leaders in Washington she plans to "probably start some companies" after leaving office.
Sources & Related Coverage
- South Carolina Public Radio, "SC Congresswoman Nancy Mace says she's ready for life outside of political office" (Aug. 20, 2026), by Maayan Schechter
- Rep. Nancy Mace, Committees and Caucuses (mace.house.gov)
- Nancy Mace, Congress.gov member page
- Maceopedia: "I Kind of Want to Whittle Sticks": Mace Says She's Done With Elected Office
- Maceopedia: "Not That I Had a Filter Before": Mace Plans Companies and Commentary After Congress
Maceopedia: Cataloging the internet record about Nancy Mace.
Read next
- August 19, 2026 · Dispatch
'I Kind of Want to Whittle Sticks': Nancy Mace Says She's Done With Elected Office
- August 20, 2026 · Dispatch
How 'Normal' Is 'Normal Nancy'?
- August 17, 2026 · Dispatch
Mace wants to ban members living with staff. Sources Say says former aides see a complication.
Juliegrace Brufke reported for Sources Say News that Rep. Nancy Mace introduced resolutions to bar House members from sexual relationships with employees and from living with employees, while former Mace staffers described earlier campaign and congressional arrangements they said complicate the line. Mace's office rejected the premise, saying the suggestion that she lived with staff, directed employees to stay at her home, or maintained a crash pad for federal employees is false.
July 22, 2026 · Dispatch"How self-loathing are they": Mace asks "how many Jews voted for Mamdani," doubles down when Piers Morgan calls it "an extraordinary charge." Israel's UN ambassador, asked twice, declines to agree.
On the July 22, 2026 episode of Piers Morgan Uncensored, Rep. Nancy Mace reacted to NYC Mayor Zohran Mamdani's call for the federal government to arrest Benjamin Netanyahu by asking "how many Jews voted for Mamdani," calling Jewish New Yorkers who backed him "self-loathing," and saying she is perplexed by "this guy coming to America eight years ago from Kampala." Mamdani moved to New York in 1999, at age 7; eight years ago matches his 2018 naturalization, not his arrival. When Morgan called her words "an extraordinary charge," Mace repeated them. Later in the same episode Morgan put her quote to Israel's UN Ambassador Danny Danon twice; Danon declined to agree both times.
August 18, 2026 · DispatchAnti-Trans Mace Shows Up at a Dorchester School Board Meeting to Back Parents Protesting a Transgender Teacher
On the night of August 18, 2026, Rep. Nancy Mace turned up at a Dorchester School District Four board meeting to back families protesting a fourth-grade teacher who is transitioning genders. 'These parents who are here tonight, they care,' Mace told the board during public comment, adding that 'these families are here because you know accommodations were made.' About ten people spoke. No South Carolina law bars a transgender person from teaching, and the district said it is legally obligated to respect its employees' rights. The ACLU of South Carolina said transgender teachers 'have every right to show up in the classroom without being harassed or intimidated.' The appearance drops a sitting member of Congress into a local school fight and fits Mace's long, self-documented record of anti-transgender statements. First reported by Live 5 News (WCSC).
August 17, 2026 · DispatchMace wants a bill to ban staff from living with members. Her own staff say they lived with her.
On August 17, 2026, Sources Say News, the Capitol Hill outlet founded by reporter Juliegrace Brufke, reported that Rep. Nancy Mace's new push to bar House members from living with their staff runs into her own history. Mace introduced two resolutions on July 30, 2026, H.Res.1465 (no sexual relationships with House employees) and H.Res.1466 (no cohabitating with House employees, married couples excepted), pitching them with the line 'a boss and a roommate should never be the same person.' Multiple former Mace aides told the outlet that a senior campaign aide lived in an apartment above the garage at her Daniel Island home during her first campaign, and that in spring 2022 a senior aide was put up in the basement of her D.C. townhouse, sleeping behind a curtain a few feet from where Mace made her morning coffee. Mace's office flatly denies she ever lived with staff or maintained a 'crash pad,' and one source and a bill proponent draw a distinction between a short platonic stay in a separate space and living with a staffer.