The Trump administration expanded its Title IX investigation into Maine, citing violations of the president’s executive order mandating that educational and athletic institutions bar biological males from competing in women’s sports.
The Maine Principals Association, the state’s primary governing body for high school athletics, and Greely High School, which has been a centerpiece in the debate over transgender sports participation in Maine, are both now being added to the list of Maine entities the Health and Human Services (HHS) Department is investigating over alleged Title IX violations, according to an HHS spokesperson. The department’s Office of Civil Rights (OCR) launched an investigation into the Maine Department of Education (MDOE) last month, “based on information that Maine intends to defy” President Donald Trump’s order to keep biological males out of women’s sports. Four days later, the agency issued MDOE a “Notice of Violation.”
“HHS will investigate and enforce Title IX to the full extent permitted by law to uphold fairness, safety, dignity, and biological truth in women’s and girls’ educational athletic opportunities,” Andrew Nixon, a department spokesperson, stated. “Men have no place in women’s sports. Maine must comply with Title IX or risk losing federal funding.”
Republican state legislators in Maine called on Democratic Gov. Janet Mills on Thursday to stand down from her open defiance of Trump’s Feb. 5 transgender sports executive order, which threatens hundreds of millions in federal funding to K-12 schools in the state, according to numbers obtained by the Portland Press Herald. MDOE received nearly a million dollars from HHS sub-agencies alone, Maine House Republicans said in a press release Thursday.
“Enough is enough; it is time to put away radical ideology and put the future of our kids first,” Assistant House Minority Leader Katrina Smith, R-Palermo, said. “The Mills administration’s policy of allowing biological boys in girls’ sports has physically and mentally mistreated our young ladies, and now this same policy will harm every child and teacher with the loss of federal funds to our schools.”
“If Maine Democrats continue to double down on allowing biological males to participate in girls’ sports, our students stand to lose hundreds of millions of dollars of federal funding. Gov. [Janet] Mills and legislative Democrats have a renewed opportunity to do the right thing, to ensure restored funding and a fair and level playing field for Maine girls,” added state Rep. Laurel Libby, R-Bangor, Thursday.
Last month, Libby was censured by Democrats in the Maine state legislature after posting on social media that a Greely High School pole vaulter, who competed as recently as June of last year as a biological male, won a statewide championship meet competing as a woman.
Libby was censured specifically for posting a picture of the high school athlete from Greely competing as a male, contrasted next to an image of the athlete winning the women’s pole-vaulting competition at Maine’s Class B state indoor championship meet in February. The athlete was a minor.
“State leaders have failed our female athletes and there needs to be repercussions for their neglect,” said Zoe, who competed in shotput at Maine’s Class B state indoor championship meet.
Trump began calling out Maine for defying his executive order shortly after Libby began sounding the alarm about the transgender athlete at Greely High School winning a statewide girls’ track meet. During a public spat with Mills at the White House, Trump threatened the state’s funding unless they “clean that up,” to which Mills responded that she would “see [him] in court.”
Sarah Perry, a civil rights attorney with extensive experience litigating Title IX issues, said she believes Maine would be unsuccessful in court on this matter for a variety of reasons.
In addition to federal law, Maine is also flouting directives from the Department of Education and a previously established precedent from a slew of cases that overturned former President Joe Biden’s Title IX regulations allowing athletic eligibility to be determined by one’s preferred gender identity, according to Perry.
“Maine entered into a contract with the Department of Education, promising to follow that federal civil rights law. [Mills’] reliance on contrary state law will prove fatal to any continued recalcitrance,” Perry said.
Mills and the Maine Principals Association (MPA) have argued that Trump’s executive order conflicts with existing state Human Rights law. The MPA said that, as a result, it would defer to state law, which allows athletic eligibility to be determined based on a person’s stated gender identity.
Maine Attorney General Aaron Frey confirmed to The New York Times on Thursday that his office received a “Notice of Violation” indicating MDOE violated federal Title IX law as a result of its continued decision to allow athletic eligibility to be determined by gender identity.
The letter arrived four days after HHS announced its Title IX investigation into MDOE on Feb. 21. Mills’ office told local outlet the Bangor Daily News that her staff had not been questioned by federal investigators prior to the violation notice being sent out.
“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,” Mills said in a statement. “It is a violation of our Constitution and of our laws, which I took an oath to uphold.”
