CHARLESTON, SC — At a campaign event the weekend before the South Carolina primary, Tom Rice, a conservative congressman now on the wrong side of former President Donald J. Trump, made a confession.
“I’ve made my next election a little bit harder than the ones in the past,” he said Friday, pleading with his supporters — a group he called “reasonable, rational people” and “good, solid Republicans” — to get him out. support in Tuesday’s polls.
Two days earlier and about 100 miles to the south, Representative Nancy Mace, another Republican in Palmetto state who drew the former president’s wrath, recognized her position as she knocked on a sweltering morning.
“I accept everything. I take responsibility. I won’t back down,” she said, confident voters in her Lowcountry district would be sympathetic. “They know that ‘hey, even if I don’t agree with her, at least she’s going to tell me where she is,'” she added.
Ms. Mace and Mr. Rice are the former president’s two targets for revenge on Tuesday. After a pro-Trump mob stormed the U.S. Capitol on January 6, 2021, they were among those who blamed the president for the attack. Ms. Mace, who was only days into her first term, said Mr Trump’s false rhetoric about the presidential election being “stolen” fueled the riots and threatened her life. Mr. Rice, whose district to the north borders Ms. Mace, immediately denounced Mr. Trump and joined nine other Republicans (but not Ms. Mace) who later voted for his impeachment.
Now, in the face of key challenges supported by the former president, the two have taken vastly different approaches to political survival. Ms. Mace has taken the teeth out of her criticism of Mr Trump and has instead attempted to discuss her conservative voting and libertarian leanings in policy discussions. Instead, Mr. Rice dug in, defending his impeachment vote and further berating Mr Trump in the process.
Should they fend off their main challengers on Tuesday, Ms. Mace and Mr. Rice will join a growing list of incumbents who have endured the wrath of the Trump wing of the GOP without ending their political careers. Still, their conflicting strategies — a reflection of both their political instincts and the differing politics of their districts — will provide a look at just how far a candidate can go in opposing Mr. Trump.
In the eyes of her supporters, Ms Mace’s past comments are less concrete than a vote to be impeached. She has strived to improve her relationship with pro-Trump sections of the GOP, spending nearly every day of the past few weeks on the campaign trail reminding voters of her Republican bona fides, not her unfiltered critique of Mr Trump.
“Everyone knows I was unhappy that day,” she said of January 6. “The whole world knows it. All my constituents know it.”
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Stretching from the left-wing corners of Charleston to the conservative country clubs of Hilton Head, her district has an electorate made up of far-right Republicans and liberal Democrats. Ms. Mace has marketed herself not only as a Conservative candidate, but also as someone who can defend the politically diverse district against a Democratic rival in November.
“It is and always will be a swing district,” she said. “I’m a conservative, but I also understand that I don’t just represent conservatives.”
However, that is not a positive message for everyone in the Low Countries.
Ted Huffman, owner of Bluffton BBQ, a restaurant located in the heart of Bluffton’s tourist downtown, said he supported Katie Arrington, the Trump-backed former state representative who hired Ms. Mace. What counted against Ms. Mace was not her feud with Mr. Trump, but her relative absence from the restaurant section of the neighborhood, Mr. Huffman said.
“Katie Arrington, she’s been here,” Mr. Huffman said, remembering the few times Mrs. Arrington visited Bluffton BBQ. “I’ve never seen Nancy Mace.”
At a Summerville event with former South Carolina governor Nikki Haley, Ms. Mace delivered a stupid speech that concluded a list of right-wing talking points: high inflation driven by President Biden’s economic agenda, an influx of immigrants to the southern border, support for military veterans. She did not mention Mr Trump.
Ms. Mace is predicting a decisive primary win against Ms. Arrington, who has put her support for Trump at the center of her campaign message. A win in light of that, Ms Mace said, would prove “the weakness of any endorsement.”
“Normally I don’t value approvals too much because they don’t matter,” she said. “It really is the candidate. It’s the person people vote for, that’s what matters.”
Speaking from her porch in Moncks Corner, SC, Deidre Stechmeyer, a 42-year-old stay-at-home mom, said she didn’t follow Ms. Mace’s race closely. But when asked about the congresswoman’s comments condemning the January 6 riots, she changed.
“That’s something I agree with her on,” she said, adding that she supported Ms Mace’s decision to certify the electoral college vote — a move some in the GOP have labeled as a final betrayal of Mr Trump. “There was so much conflict and uncertainty. I feel like it should have been certified.”
Mr Rice’s impeachment vote, on the other hand, represents a more recognizable turnaround.
It’s one of the reasons Mrs Mace has a comfortable lead in her race, according to recent pollswhile Mr. Rice faces many more primary challengers and is most likely headed for a runoff with Trump-approved state representative, Russell Fry, after Tuesday.
The campaign of Mr. Fry has the impeachment vote of Mr. Rice in his message, turning the vote into a referendum on Mr. Rice in Congress.
“It’s about more than Donald Trump. It’s about a sitting congressman losing the trust of a very conservative district,” said Matt Moore, former chairman of the South Carolina Republican Party and adviser to Mr. Fry’s campaign.
Still, Mr. Rice on his hyper-conservative economic record and his once unabashed support for the former president to land him a sixth term in one of South Carolina’s most pro-Trump congressional districts.
In an interview, Mr. Rice noted that the Republican Party is shifting toward shifting social issues over policy — something he says was driven in part by the party’s former president’s wing, which helped redefine social issues. the.
He also explained what the Republican Party should stand for: “less taxes, less government, more freedom, individual responsibility, the American dream,” he said. “If we’re not for that, then I don’t know what the Republican Party is about.”
The impeachment vote has also won him favor with some voters. Rick Giles, a Rice supporter in Conway, SC, said he admired Mr. Rice for his voice.
“He stood up to Trump when a lot of people didn’t,” said Mr Giles. “He stood on his values. He didn’t go with the party line. I like that.”
Mr. Rice’s district, in the northeast corner of South Carolina along the border with North Carolina, is one of the most conservative in the state, favoring Republicans by nearly 30 points. And before the impeachment vote, Mr. Rice was one of Mr. Trump’s most staunch supporters, with a voting record that matched Mr Trump’s position more than 90 percent of the time.
“It’s not about my voting behaviour. It’s not about my support for Trump. It’s not about my ideology. It’s not because the other man is good,” Mr. Rice said. “There’s only one reason why he’s doing this. And it is only for revenge.”
Mr. Trump has had less success in the states that fueled his primary challenger push. In Georgia, two of its most prominent enemies, Governor Brian Kemp and Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger, handily won their primaries against challengers backed by the former president. The two House races where he did not support the incumbents have come to a runoff.
Mark Sanford, a former congressman who was defeated by Ms. Arrington in 2018 after Mr. Trump backed her main challenge, predicted that Ms. Mace would prevail.
“I think she’s doing well,” he said, pointing to the increasing number of state transplants from northern states, which favor established candidates. “That bodes well for Nancy, it doesn’t bode well for Katie.”
Still, he said, Tuesday’s outcome is unlikely to change the former president’s approach to politics.
“It’s binary with Trump,” said Mr. Sanford. “You’re not half in, half out — you’re in or out.”
