AUGUSTA, Maine — President Donald Trump and Gov. Janet Mills are fighting over it. The Maine House of Representatives voted Tuesday along party lines to censure the Republican lawmaker whose social media posts about it set off a firestorm.
Yet the debate over Maine’s policies that allow transgender students to participate in girls sports is just beginning. A Republican rolled out a sweeping bill on the issue Wednesday that is unlikely to receive wide support among the Democrats who control the State House, but rank-and-file members could be more open-minded once the issue goes to a vote.
Rep. Dave Rollins, D-Augusta, a freshman lawmaker and former Cony High School basketball star whose daughter played at Harvard University, said he has not seen the text of any proposals but that he is generally against transgender girls competing in girls sports.
“I also think there’s going to be overwhelming bipartisan support for that,” Rollins said, adding he has heard similar sentiments from members of his party.
The nuance here underscores polls showing that Republicans are on the popular side of this fraught culture-war issue. A New York Times-Ipsos survey in January found that 79 percent of Americans, including two-thirds of Democrats, think transgender women should not be allowed to compete in women’s sports.
Maine is one of 23 states that allow transgender students to participate in sports consistent with their gender identity, according to the Movement Advancement Project. That policy governing was implemented by the Maine Principals’ Association in 2021, after the Democratic-led Legislature added further gender identity protections to the state’s anti-discrimination law.
For eight years before that, the association governing scholastic sports considered requests to participate on a case-by-case basis and assessed them for safety concerns. Only 54 requests were considered during that time, and only four involved transgender girls. Around 3.5 percent of Maine high school students have reported they are transgender.
Maine’s current controversy was sparked after a transgender student from Greely High School won a girls indoor track title earlier this month. Rep. Laurel Libby, R-Auburn, made a post picturing and identifying the student that went viral in conservative media and drew the eye of the Republican president.
Last week, Trump threatened Maine’s federal funding over its athletic policies. The next day, he doubled down during a White House exchange with the Democratic governor. His administration then launched three investigations into Maine and educational institutions here for possible violations of Title IX, the federal law barring sex-based discrimination in schools.
Before Trump weighed in, Maine Republicans including Libby were saying schools should lose federal funding that is at stake in the investigations. She has become the face of opposition to Maine’s policies, particularly after the Democratic-led House censured her on Tuesday for identifying the Greely student in her post and not taking it down.
Libby refused to apologize to the chamber, which led House Speaker Ryan Fecteau, D-Biddeford, to invoke a House rule stripping her of voting and speaking privileges. She later told reporters that she would never apologize for speaking up for girls “who do not have anyone speaking up for them.”
On Wednesday, Rep. Liz Caruso, R-Caratunk, introduced a bill that would bar transgender girls from female sports sanctioned by public schools and colleges. It would also go beyond sports to mandate male- and female-only bathrooms with limited exceptions. People could sue schools for failure to comply under the proposal.
“Win or lose, male athletes are taking opportunities from female athletes, and that’s not just unfair, it’s discriminatory,” Caruso said.
The Legislature rejected a similar bill last year, which went down along party lines in the House. After the censure vote on Tuesday, Fecteau tried to separate Libby’s conduct from the underlying policy debate, saying lawmakers are going to delve into it later on this year.
“This is about the conduct of a member of this body,” he said at a news conference.