WASHINGTON (Reuters) -U.S. Attorney General Pam Bondi said on Wednesday that the Justice Department is filing a lawsuit against Maine, escalating President Donald Trump’s conflict with the state for refusing to ban transgender athletes from participating in women’s and girls’ sports.
The lawsuit provided by the Justice Department alleges that Maine is violating Title IX, which affords legal protection against sex discrimination, by allowing transgender female athletes to participate in girls’ and women’s sports.
The lawsuit cites two instances in which transgender athletes won girls’ competitions, including a pole vaulter who won the state indoor track and field state championships in February.
When asked on Wednesday whether it’s worth the department’s resources to sue Maine over two athletes, Bondi replied, “I don’t care if it’s one. I don’t care if it’s two. I don’t care if it’s 100.”
Bondi said the department is also probing transgender issues in other states including Minnesota and California.
Maine Governor Janet Mills said in a statement on Wednesday that the suit was an example of Trump trying to impose his will on state governments.
“This matter has never been about school sports or the protection of women and girls, as has been claimed, it is about states rights and defending the rule of law against a federal government bent on imposing its will, instead of upholding the law,” Mills said. “Let today serve as warning to all states: Maine might be among the first to draw the ire of the Federal government in this way, but we will not be the last.”
Trump frequently railed against transgender athletes while on the campaign trail and signed an executive order banning transgender athletes from competing in women’s sports. He prominently clashed with Mills, a Democrat, over the issue at a February White House meeting.
Proponents of Trump’s action say it protects the fairness of competition, while opponents say it excludes young transgender people from important physical and social activity.
The majority of Americans do not support transgender athletes competing in girls’ and women’s sports, polling shows. Just 26% of respondents to a February Reuters/Ipsos poll agreed that they should at the elementary and high school level, with 55% opposed and the rest unsure. Just 19% supported the idea of transgender women competing in elite-level women’s sports, like college, the Olympics and professional leagues, with 65% opposed.
Maine is expected to see competitive House and Senate races in next year’s midterm elections that will help determine control of Congress.
FUNDING FIGHT
The lawsuit comes five days after the administration tried to cut off all of Maine’s federal funding for public schools and its school lunch program over the issue.
The U.S. Department of Agriculture notified Maine on April 2 that it was freezing school lunch funding, citing Title IX violations.
A U.S. District Court judge temporarily blocked the USDA from choking off funds after Maine sued the federal government.
Earlier on April 2, the Department of Education announced that it was cutting off the state’s $250 million in K-12 public education funds as part of an administrative proceeding.
The Justice Department on April 7 also pulled more than $1.5 billion in federal grants from Maine’s Department of Corrections.
Maine’s assistant attorney general, Sarah Forster, told the U.S. Department of Education in an April 11 letter that the state would not sign a proposed draft resolution or any revisions.
“Nothing in Title IX or its implementing regulations prohibits schools from allowing transgender girls and women to participate on girls’ and women’s sports teams,” she wrote. “Your letters to date do not cite a single case that so holds.”
Out of 510,000 athletes competing at the collegiate level, fewer than 10 publicly identify as transgender, NCAA President Charlie Baker said in January.
Transgender people make up a small portion of the overall U.S. population. More than 1.6 million adults aged 18 and older and youth between the ages of 13 through 17 identify as transgender in the United States, according to a 2022 report from the Williams Institute at the UCLA School of Law.
A large percentage of transgender adults have also attempted or contemplated suicide, according to a 2023 report from the same group, which found that 81% of transgender adults in the United States have thought about suicide and 42% have attempted it.
(Reporting by Sarah N. Lynch; Additional reporting by Nate Raymond in Boston; Editing by Scott Malone, Leslie Adler and Mark Porter)
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