Tue. Feb 25th, 2025

Maine Gov. Janet Mills reacts after challenging President Donald Trump over federal law on the issue of transgender athletes in school sports as Trump addressed a meeting of governors at the White House on Feb. 21, 2025, in Washington, D.C. (Photo by Win McNamee/Getty Images)

Officials in Maine started their week with not one but two federal agency investigations into alleged Title IX violations after Democratic Gov. Janet Mills on Friday dared to defy President Donald Trump to his face, on his home turf — something we have not really seen since the start of his second term.

“See you in court,” Mills now famously told the president in response to his threat to withhold federal funding if Maine doesn’t comply with his ban on transgender women competing on women’s sports teams.

Mills’ bravery was celebrated by Trump’s critics and particularly the LGBTQ+ community, which has been the focus of an onslaught of attacks by the federal government in recent weeks.

But in a statement released late Friday, the governor made clear that while she was standing up for the rights of transgender Mainers, she was doing so because they are protected by state law, which she holds sacred.

“I have spent my career — as a District Attorney, as Attorney General, and now as Governor — standing up for the rule of law in Maine and America. To me, that is fundamentally what is at stake here: the rule of law in our country,” Mills wrote.

“No president — Republican or Democrat — can withhold federal funding authorized and appropriated by Congress and paid for by Maine taxpayers in an attempt to coerce someone into compliance with his will. It is a violation of our Constitution and of our laws, which I took an oath to uphold.”

Cynical focus on transgender athletes

During the exchange, Trump told Mills that Maine’s population, “even though it’s somewhat liberal” doesn’t support transgender women playing women’s sports.

If local polling has been done on the issue, I haven’t seen it, but I don’t think it’s an issue most voters would have thought or cared about had certain politicians and cable news pundits not seized on it with the ferocity of a rabid raccoon.

It has been welldocumented that conservatives’ focus on transgender women in sports is a cynical ploy to galvanize support among those who wouldn’t otherwise be on board with agenda items like cutting taxes for billionaires or slashing health care.

As the LGBTQ+ advocacy group Human Rights Campaign noted, “transgender students’ participation in sports has been a non-issue; many states, athletic organizations, and governing bodies successfully balanced fairness, inclusion, and access to play without any problem.” 

From 2013 to 2021, when the Maine Human Rights Act was amended to include gender identity as a protected class, the Maine Principals’ Association, which governs school sports, had a policy that gave the organization oversight of participation by transgender athletes in interscholastic activities. During that period, they held hearings for a total of 56 transgender students who wished to participate in athletics, just four of whom were transgender girls.

But for people like Trump or Maine Rep. Laurel Libby — whose Facebook post sharing photographs and personal details about a transgender high school athlete kicked off this whole fiasco — attacking a very small group of extremely vulnerable kiddos makes great political theater. And one just has to glance at the comments on that Facebook post, or the emails in my inbox, to see that these efforts are paying off and whole swaths of voters are now foaming at the mouth over this non-issue.

What last week’s interaction made clear is that Mills sees right through it and she is not willing to forgo the legally protected rights of one marginalized group, because she knows it won’t stop there. In standing up to Trump, she stood up for the rights of trans kids and all Mainers to be protected, not singled out and persecuted. 

“Maine may be one of the first states to undergo an investigation by his administration, but we won’t be the last,” she warned in her statement, noting that while Trump “has targeted one particular group on one particular issue … you must ask yourself: who and what will he target next, and what will he do? 

“Will it be you? Will it be because of your race or your religion? Will it be because you look different or think differently? Where does it end?” she asked. 

Predicting that the outcome of this “politically directed investigation” is “predetermined,” the governor said she would work with Attorney General Aaron Frey “to defend the interests of Maine people.”

“But do not be misled: this is not just about who can compete on the athletic field,” Mills cautioned, “this is about whether a president can force compliance with his will, without regard for the rule of law that governs our nation.”

Maine may pay a price for Mills’ action. But if others follow her lead and refuse to barter away people’s rights — regardless of how difficult or unpopular — it’s possible we may keep this tyranny in check.

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