South Carolina prosecutors have filed criminal sex-offense charges against Patrick Bryant, the former fiancé of U.S. Rep. Nancy Mace, and two other men whom Mace accused by name during a speech on the floor of the U.S. House of Representatives. The charges were announced by the South Carolina Attorney General’s Office after an investigation by the State Law Enforcement Division (SLED) into allegations centered in the Charleston area.
The announcement marks the first time the state has moved criminally against any of the men Mace identified in her February 10, 2025, floor speech, in which the Republican congresswoman said she had discovered evidence that she and other women were sexually assaulted and secretly recorded. Mace named four men that night. Three of them, including Bryant, now face charges, according to the attorney general’s office and court filings described by outlets covering the case.
What the charges allege
According to the attorney general’s office, the counts stem from alleged non-consensual sexual contact and the alleged use of concealed cameras and recording devices to capture images of women without their knowledge or consent. Bryant, a Charleston-area businessman, faces the most serious allegations in the case, including criminal sexual conduct and voyeurism-related counts. The two other men face charges connected to the alleged recording and distribution of intimate images.
Under South Carolina law, criminal sexual conduct is graded by degree, with first-degree offenses carrying the longest potential prison terms. Voyeurism — described in state statute as unlawfully photographing or recording another person in a place where that person has a reasonable expectation of privacy — is prosecuted as a misdemeanor or felony depending on the circumstances and whether images were shared.
Prosecutors have not released a detailed timeline of the alleged conduct, and several filings in the matter are expected to remain under seal to protect the identities of alleged victims. The attorney general’s office, which took over the prosecution rather than leaving it with a local solicitor, has said it will not comment beyond its initial statement while the cases are pending.
No defendant has entered a plea to the charges as of publication, and none has been convicted. Under the U.S. and South Carolina constitutions, each is presumed innocent.
The House floor speech that started it
Mace’s roughly hour-long speech in February 2025 was extraordinary in form as well as content. Standing in the chamber with poster-sized exhibits, she said she had found photographs and video on an electronic device in late 2023 that showed women, including herself, being recorded without consent. She said one image appeared to involve a person under the age of 18 and told colleagues she had reported her findings to law enforcement.
She named four men from the floor, where members enjoy broad protection from civil liability for statements made in the course of legislative business under the Constitution’s Speech or Debate Clause. Mace acknowledged that protection during the speech and said she was willing to accept the consequences of naming the men publicly.
The speech drew immediate attention for its graphic detail and for the questions it raised about where a sitting lawmaker’s personal grievance ends and official business begins. Legal commentators noted at the time that the clause shields a member from being sued over floor remarks but does not establish that the underlying allegations are true, nor does it substitute for a criminal investigation.
The men’s responses
Bryant has consistently and publicly denied the allegations, calling them false and defamatory. His attorneys have said he cooperated with investigators and welcomed scrutiny of the claims. The two other men charged have likewise denied wrongdoing through counsel. One of the four men named in the speech pursued civil litigation against Mace after the remarks, arguing that statements she made outside the House chamber — in interviews and on social media — were not covered by congressional immunity.
Defense lawyers in the criminal case are expected to focus on the chain of custody of the digital evidence, the length of the investigation, and the effect of extensive pretrial publicity on the ability to seat an impartial jury. Those arguments are common in cases that begin with public accusations rather than a police report, and they are among the first issues judges typically must resolve.
A long investigative gap
The interval between Mace’s public accusations and the filing of charges — roughly a year and a half — has drawn criticism from advocates for sexual assault survivors, who argue that digital-evidence cases frequently stall. Investigators and prosecutors generally counter that forensic extraction of devices, identification of unknown individuals in images, and jurisdictional questions across county and state lines take time, and that premature charges risk collapsing in court.
Delays of that kind are not unique to high-profile cases. Institutions and law enforcement agencies have faced similar scrutiny over how quickly they respond to sexual misconduct allegations, from university disciplinary systems — as when Cornell University suspended fraternity social events after a gang rape allegation — to decades-old criminal files, including the 65-year-old Chicago child killing in which a former detective was recently named.
Political backdrop
Mace, who has represented South Carolina’s 1st Congressional District since 2021, is a candidate for governor of South Carolina, with the state’s gubernatorial election set for November 2026. She has spoken publicly about being raped at 16 and has made victims’ rights legislation part of her platform.
Mace has said she will not comment on specifics while the prosecutions proceed, thanking SLED and the attorney general’s office for what she described as a thorough review. Her political opponents and supporters alike have been drawn into commentary about the case, though the attorney general’s office has emphasized that the charging decision was made by career prosecutors on the evidence.
What happens next
- Bond and arraignment: Each defendant must appear for a bond hearing and formal arraignment, where conditions of release and any no-contact orders are set.
- Indictment: Felony charges in South Carolina generally proceed by grand jury indictment before a case can be tried.
- Discovery disputes: Expect fights over sealed materials, device images and the scope of evidence that can be shown to a jury.
- Timeline: Complex digital-evidence prosecutions commonly take a year or more to reach trial, and many resolve by plea.
Official filings and statements in the matter are published by the South Carolina Attorney General’s Office. Readers should treat unverified claims circulating on social media with caution; the allegations described in a floor speech and the counts a prosecutor can prove in court are separate questions, and only the second will be settled in a courtroom.
