On Tuesday, a conservative Maine lawmaker singled out a transgender student winning a girls indoor track and field title at the state championship a day earlier.
By Thursday, the story had reached President Donald Trump. He vowed to withhold federal funding from Maine if it continued to allow transgender students to compete in alignment with their gender identity.
The next day, Trump and Gov. Janet Mills had a tense back-and-forth exchange about the issue during an event with other governors at the White House. The Trump administration then said it will conduct a Title IX investigation into Maine’s education department and the Cumberland school district attended by the student that Rep. Laurel Libby, R-Auburn, identified in an initial Facebook post that has since been shared more than 12,000 times.
The flurry of activity thrust the state into the national spotlight and reignited debates over the politically fraught issue of transgender children competing in girls’ sports. Around 3.5 percent of Maine high school students have reported they are transgender. There is no clear data available on how many compete in scholastic sports, but there are likely few.
“We are the federal law. You better do it because you’re not going to get any federal funds,” Trump said in telling Mills to change the state’s transgender policies for sports.
“We’ll see you in court,” Mills shot back.
Maine is among 23 states that allow students to compete in sports consistent with their identified gender, according to the Movement Advancement Project. Trump’s threat remained vague in terms of whether he would try to pull only federal education funding for Maine schools or seek a more drastic and legally dubious move to pull away all federal dollars from the state.
What was clear by the end of the week is Trump is not backing away from an issue he stoked on the campaign trail and one he highlighted in his executive order earlier in February to take federal funds from educational institutions that allow transgender female athletes to compete.
“He probably will try to carry this out,” said Laurence Tribe, a liberal constitutional law professor emeritus at Harvard University. “His MAGA base is very energized.”
Tribe and other constitutional law experts, including University of Maine law professor Dmitry Bam and University of Houston law professor Seth Chandler, noted Congress, rather than the president, generally has the authority to distribute and attach conditions to federal money. While Trump can issue executive orders directing how agencies dole out funds, they said he may continue to see judges block them if they create new conditions.
Bam thinks Trump may “argue that he is not creating new conditions but rather interpreting the conditions previously imposed by Congress,” such as by arguing transgender female students participating in girls’ sports violates Title IX, the law President Richard Nixon signed in 1972 to ban sex-based discrimination in school programs that get federal funding.
But the legal experts said that argument may not succeed if a case even reaches the point of debating the merits of transgender girls competing in sports.
“I don’t think it’s a slam dunk,” Chandler said, adding he feels the same about those who would argue states must allow transgender athletes to compete in order to get federal money.
EqualityMaine Executive Director Gia Drew thanked Mills for “speaking up for Mainers in this time of uncertainty and chaos that the president of the United States has needlessly created.” Drew said Libby “crossed a line” by “attacking a kid for political gains and creating unnecessary fear” for the family and other transgender kids.
The Maine Principals’ Association responded to Trump’s Feb. 5 order by saying it will continue its yearslong practice of allowing transgender female students to compete. Libby and Assistant House Minority Leader Katrina Smith, R-Palermo, said that means Maine schools should lose their federal money that accounted for roughly 10 percent of their funding in recent years.
Smith called for supporters to report Maine schools to the U.S. Department of Education’s civil rights office and also said she hopes to “avoid any disruption to our kids and teachers.” Rep. Kelly Noonan Murphy, a Scarborough Democrat who chairs the Legislature’s education committee, said a loss of federal funds would lead to higher taxes and “directly harm students.”
The Democratic-controlled Legislature returns to Augusta on Tuesday to try to finally pass a short-term budget. Libby’s name and Trump’s recent threat may also arise in floor debates.
On Monday, students will come back to Greely High School from February vacation with increased security, with a notice from Superintendent Jeffrey Porter citing no specific threat but online posts that have been “concerning” to members of the school community. Porter also expressed the district’s “unwavering support for all of our students.”
“This support is unconditional for all students as valued members of our school community,” Porter wrote.