Maine gov brushes off state's trans athlete issue, says she's 'appalled' at Trump admin
Maine Gov. Janet Mills downplayed the uproar over the state’s transgender-inclusion policies in girls’ and women’s sports on Monday and said she was "appalled" over the Trump administration’s lawsuits against her state amid a battle over federal funds.
Mills appeared on MSNBC’s "Morning Joe" to discuss her battle with several departments of the Trump administration, which started when the state refused to comply with President Donald Trump’s "No Men in Women’s Sports" executive order which prohibited biological males in girls’ and women’s sports.
The state did not comply with the order, which kick-started the issue.
"The chief executive is required by the Constitution to take care that the laws be faithfully executed, not to make the laws, not to invent the laws or reinterpret the laws by tweet or Instagram post or press release or executive order. He’s not allowed to do that.
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"So, when he reinterpreted Title IX … I support Title IX. I have spent the better part of my career protecting the rights of women and girls in healthcare, in employment, housing credit and the like and I’m appalled. I was appalled at his interpretation that he can just reinvent the law."
Mills recalled the letters she received from the Department of Education, the Department of Agriculture (USDA) and the Department of Health and Human Services. She described an April 2 letter from USDA Secretary Brooke Rollins as "rather appalling" and said some described it as a "ransom note."
In the letter, the administration threatened to cut off funding for Maine because of the state’s continued allowance of biological males in girls’ and women’s sports.
"The very next day, because there are maybe at most two transgender athletes competing in Maine schools right now, they decided to shut off funding for our school nutrition program, the school lunch program, entirely, on which 172,000 Maine schoolchildren rely on for their school meals. That didn’t make any sense," Mills said.
She added that the lawsuits against the state were "not rational."
A federal judge granted Maine a temporary restraining order and ruled the funding freeze must be lifted.
"This temporary restraining order confirms the Trump Administration did not follow the rule of law when it cut program funds that go to feed school children and vulnerable adults," Maine Attorney General Aaron Frey said in a statement. "This order preserves Maine’s access to certain congressionally appropriated funds by prohibiting an unlawful freeze by the administration.
"No one in our constitutional republic is above the law and we will continue to fight to hold this administration to account."
The USDA "must immediately unfreeze and release to the state of Maine any federal funding that they have frozen or failed or refused to pay because of the state of Maine's alleged failure to comply with the requirements of Title IX," District Court Judge John Woodcock’s ruling read.
The administration was also "barred from freezing, terminating, or otherwise interfering with the state of Maine's future federal funding for alleged violations of Title IX without complying with the legally required procedure."
Maine has refused to comply with Trump’s executive order to ban biological males from girls’ and women’s sports. Trump initially vowed to cut federal funding to the state if it were to refuse to comply with the order during a Feb. 20 speech.
Maine officials filed a lawsuit against the USDA last week following the agency’s decision to freeze funding to the state.
The state accused the USDA of "withholding funding used to feed children in schools, childcare centers, and after-school programming as well as disabled adults in congregate settings," an argument the judge agreed with. The judge noted that the freeze was due to Title IX violations, but it restricted the ability to "provid[e] meals to children and vulnerable adults."
Meanwhile, Maine residents have made their opinions known when it came to transgender athletes in girls’ and women’s sports.
A March poll showed that 64% of Maine residents believe transgender athletes "definitely should not" or "probably should not" participate in girls’ and women’s sports. Only 29% of Maine residents believed that transgender athletes "probably should" or "definitely should" compete against girls and women in sports.
The poll also showed that 56% of Maine Democrats believe that transgender athletes should be allowed to compete in girls’ and women’s sports.
When it came to enacting policies to combat the issue of transgender participation in sports, the poll showed that 50% of Maine residents wanted it at the federal level, while 41% believe policy should be left up to the states.
Maine is also among the states that were warned about housing prisoners by biological sex or face a funding cutoff.
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