"I just go off the rails sometimes": Mace responds to critics who call her 'crazy'

Rep. Nancy Mace told Tara Palmeri on September 1, 2026 that she "just goes off the rails sometimes" and that people label her "crazy" for it. Her answer: being nice "has gotten us off the rails." The statement came in the middle of a broader passage about her motivation to fight for women's safety legislation and her frustration at being dismissed when she does.

The quote connects the personal to the political. Mace framed "going off the rails" not as a personal failing but as a necessary response to a system that she said rewarded passivity and punished women who fought back.

Captioned clip from the Tara Palmeri Show, September 1, 2026. Watch the full interview on YouTube.

The exchange

The verbatim passage, from the Tara Palmeri Show, September 1, 2026. The statement came mid-monologue, as Mace was describing what drives her:

Mace: ...the fact that we have women, our own sex, out there advocating for that kind of thing drives me even more insane. And I think it's a motivator why I just, I just go off the rails sometimes. And people say it, oh, she's crazy. It's, no, we have to go so far in this direction because you guys have taken us, being nice has gotten us off the rails. I'm just bringing back common sense. And so, it certainly drives my passion. It drives what I feel I've been called to do while I've been in Congress. And it's also why I'm leaving Congress, because I can't get shit done.

The "also why I'm leaving Congress" line was the direct continuation of the "off the rails" passage. Mace treated the two ideas as inseparable: her willingness to fight hard, and her inability to convert that fight into legislation.

Context

The passage came near the end of a discussion about what motivated Mace's work on women's safety issues. She had earlier described being assaulted at 16 as the formative experience that shaped her public career and had connected that to her frustration at not having been able to pass legislation to protect others.

"Women, our own sex, out there advocating for that kind of thing," she said, referring to women she believed were opposing protections she championed. She described this as "driving me through the roof."

She defined "going off the rails" not in the way critics use it but as her own description of intensity in service of a cause she considers common sense. She explicitly rejected the "crazy" label: the issue is that the system, not she, has "gotten off the rails."

In the same interview she told Palmeri she would "feel much freer" when she leaves Congress on January 3rd.

Watch

The full Tara Palmeri Show interview is available on YouTube. This exchange begins at approximately 5:36:

Sources

• Tara Palmeri Show, "MACE ON BEING MACE," YouTube, September 1, 2026 (primary source; exchange at 5:36)
• The Tara Palmeri Show: tarapalmeri.com