Rep. Nancy Mace (R-S.C.) hit back at former Speaker Kevin McCarthy (R-Calif.) on Monday after he said she needs help “to straighten out her life” last week, twisting the insult into a fundraising pitch.
McCarthy went after Mace on Tuesday in a Capitol Hill visit. The pair have feuded after she was one of eight GOP members who voted to oust him from the Speakership in October.
“I hope Nancy gets the help she needs, I really do,” McCarthy told reporters. “I just hope she gets the help to straighten out her life. I mean, she’s got a lot of challenges.”
“No one will stay working for her,” he continued. “You can’t have somebody who just flips and flops based upon what TV station she gets put on. You want someone who’s willing to work, and so I hope she gets that kind of help.”
Mace admitted that she does need help, but not in the way McCarthy thinks.
“Kevin McCarthy just can’t help himself as I am living rent free in his head. He got one thing right, however; I do need help,” she wrote on X, the platform formerly known as Twitter. “I need your help to fight back against the corrupt DC establishment and their handpicked puppet.”
“He put our majority at risk. He lied to the American people,” she said in the fundraising video. “He couldn’t even hold his speakership because he’s a loser.”
Mace added that one of her primary opponents, Catherine Templeton, is a “hand-picked puppet” of McCarthy.
The former Speaker said last week that he’s not rooting against Mace right now, but he did not rule out backing challengers to incumbent Republicans in 2024, including her.
“I didn’t say that,” McCarthy jokingly said when asked about staying out of her primary.
Mace is facing a difficult primary, with challenges from both Templeton and her former chief of staff, Dan Hanlon.