President Donald Trump delivers remarks at the Republican Governors Association meeting at the National Building Museum on February 20, 2025 in Washington, DC. (Photo by Win McNamee/Getty Images)
Maine officials said the state will not be bullied by Donald Trump after the president threatened to withhold federal funding unless Maine complies with his recent executive order barring transgender athletes from competing on women’s sports teams consistent with their gender identity.
“Anyone here from Maine?” the president asked the crowd during a speech at the Republican Governors Association meeting in Washington, D.C. on Thursday. “They are still saying they want men to play in women’s sports and I cannot believe that they are doing that…so we’re not gonna give them any federal funding until they clean that up.”
The executive order, which the president signed on Feb. 5 as part of the administration’s broader anti-trans agenda, rescinds federal funds from “educational programs” if schools fail to adhere to the ban.
The administration is asking federal agencies to interpret Title IX — a federal civil rights law barring schools that receive federal funding from practicing sex-based discrimination — in a way that complies with the order.
In a statement shared early Friday, Gov. Janet Mills — who is in Washington, D.C attending a meeting of the National Governors Association — said “the State of Maine will not be intimidated by the president’s threats.”
“If the president attempts to unilaterally deprive Maine school children of the benefit of federal funding, my administration and the attorney general will take all appropriate and necessary legal action to restore that funding and the academic opportunity it provides,” Mills said.
Maine Attorney General Aaron Frey said any attempt by the president to cut federal funding to Maine over the issue “would be illegal and in direct violation of federal court orders.”
“Fortunately,” Frey wrote in a statement, “the rule of law still applies in this country, and I will do everything in my power to defend Maine’s laws and block efforts by the president to bully and threaten us.”
He added, “It is disturbing that President Trump would use children as pawns in advancing his political agenda.”
Trump’s comments came days after a Republican state lawmaker shared photographs and personal details about a transgender high school athlete on her legislative Facebook page — a move that drew swift condemnation from members of both parties.
In the post, Rep. Laurel Libby of Auburn called out the Maine Principals Association for its decision not to enforce the executive order and continue to allow transgender athletes to participate in female sports in accordance with the Maine Human Rights Act, which prohibits discrimination based on gender identity, among other protected classes.
Earlier this month, lawyers and Title IX experts told States Newsroom (the parent organization of Maine Morning Star) it remains to be seen how the Trump administration would enforce the broad order, which is expected to face several legal challenges.
Last week, two New Hampshire teenagers named Trump and other federal officials in a lawsuit over the directive, arguing that it violates equal protection rights for transgender students in the Fifth Amendment as well as the federal Title IX law.
The Human Rights Campaign, an LGBTQ+ advocacy group, has noted that there has been “considerable disinformation and misinformation about what the inclusion of transgender youth in sports entails” and that trans students’ sports participation “has been a non-issue; many states, athletic organizations, and governing bodies successfully balanced fairness, inclusion, and access to play without any problem.”
The Maine Principals Association’s transgender participation policy was in effect from 2013 to 2021, when the Maine Human Rights Act was amended to include gender identity as a protected class. As the Bangor Daily News pointed out, in 2023, the organization testified that during the time their policy was in place, they heard from “56 transgender students wishing to participate in high school athletics with four being transgender girls.”
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