U.S. Rep. Nancy Mace (R-SC) arrived in message mode at the Longworth House Office Building in Washington, DC for today’s candidate forum with House Republicans to hear from members running for U.S. Speaker of House.
Mace wore a white t-shirt emblazoned with a large capital A on the front. When asked about the shirt she said: “I’m wearing the scarlet letter after the week I just had. Being a woman up here and being demonized for my vote and for my voice.”
She added: “I don’t answer to anyone in D.C. I don’t answer to anyone in Washington. I only answer to the people.”
Mace: I’m wearing the scarlet letter after the week I had being a woman and being demonized for my vote and voice. pic.twitter.com/guVpxGHUq7
— Acyn (@Acyn) October 10, 2023
Mace’s fashion show refers to the protagonist of the 1850 Nathaniel Hawthorne novel The Scarlet Letter, Hester Prynne, a woman condemned by her Puritan neighbors for having a child out of wedlock. Prynne is forced to wear a scarlet letter A (the A is for “Adultery”) for the rest of her life.
[Related: Rep. Nancy Mace Says “I’m A Sinner” After Sex Talk Blows Up]
In an interesting twist, some of the “people” Mace says she answers to may soon be unable to decipher her message — that she is being persecuted like Hester Prynne — because students being educated in some public schools today won’t have the context to process the Congresswoman’s literary reference to Hawthorne.
That’s because of a new surge in book bans across the country, most conspicuously under Florida Governor Ron DeSantis‘s new restrictive book ban laws, where The Scarlet Letter is one of the more than 150 books which have been removed (for its sexual content) from a large Orlando-area Florida school district. Others include Milton’s Paradise Lost and The Invisible Man.
Below is video from a 2022 House Oversight Committee hearing, where Mace (who was the vice chair of the subcommittee) questioned witnesses about parents’ ability to decide what books are in school libraries.
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