The South Carolina Republican Party voted Saturday to censure one of its own members, Rep. Tom Rice, for voting to impeach Donald Trump .
According to a copy of the censure resolution obtained by The Post and Courier , South Carolina Republicans accused Rice of siding with House Speaker Nancy Pelosi over Trump.
“In the first and most consequential vote of the new session, Mr. Rice sided with Nancy Pelosi and the unprincipled Leftists by voting to impeach the President, betraying the Republican voters that supported Mr. Rice enthusiastically during the last two election cycles.”
Forty-three members voted in favor of censuring the congressman and two abstained. Not a single one of them voiced opposition to the resolution, according to party spokeswoman Claire Robinson.
Though symbolic, the move signals that Rice will have to fight for his seat and fend off a formidable primary challenger. The last time the South Carolina GOP moved to censure its own member came over a decade ago, when they condemned then-Governor Mark Sanford for having an extramarital affair.
Rice voted to impeach Trump over the January 6 riots at the U.S. Capitol. According to House Democrats, who drafted the impeachment article, the former commander-in-chief is guilty of inciting an insurrection against the U.S. government because he directed his supporters to storm the Capitol building in order to stop the certification of Electoral College votes for the 2020 presidential election.
In a statement, Rice hit back at the South Carolina GOP, saying that Trump is clearly guilty of impeachable offenses.
“If the president who did what Donald Trump did that day and sent a mob to stall Congress and the result was an attack on the legislative branch of the United States government, that is a clear violation of the constitution. I don’t care if the president that does that is Republican or a Democrat, I’m voting for impeachment,” Rice stated.
The congressman said that he will continue to work with state party leaders, but noted that they should have spoken to him before casting their votes.
South Carolina GOP chairman Drew McKissick said that the condemnation demonstrates conservatives across the state disapprove of what Rice did. He said that the lawmaker’s vote achieved nothing and only helped Democrats.
McKissick insisted that Trump bears no responsibility for the January 6 riots, saying that the protests were planned weeks in advance of his rally in Washington, D.C.
Ten House Republicans supported the Democrats’ effort to remove Trump from office. According to Trump’s longtime adviser Corey Lewandowski , the former commander-in-chief will campaign against them and support their primary challengers.
