Maine won't sign feds' Title IX compliance; DOJ moves to prosecute state

(The Center Square) — The Trump administration is taking Maine to court and pulling back federal education funding over its refusal to sign an agreement to block transgender athletes from competing in women's and girls' sports.

On Friday, the U.S. Department of Education announced that it was referring its Title IX investigation of the Maine Department of Education to the Department of Justice for further enforcement action.

The federal agency said it will also begin administrative proceedings to pull back the state's federal K through 12 education funding, including formula funds and discretionary grants.

Friday was the deadline to respond to the Trump administration's demands to sign the agreement, but Attorney General Aaron Frey responded with a one-page letter saying state officials won't sign it and "do not have revisions to counter propose... We agree that we are at an impasse," Frey wrote in the letter, co-authored by the state's Education Department.

Craig Trainor, the DOE's acting assistant secretary for civil rights, said the Maine Department of Education will "now have to defend its discriminatory practices" before an administrative law judge and as well in a federal court against the Justice Department.

"The Department has given Maine every opportunity to come into compliance with Title IX, but the state's leaders have stubbornly refused to do so, choosing instead to prioritize an extremist ideological agenda over their students' safety, privacy, and dignity," he said. "Governor Mills would have done well to adhere to the wisdom embedded in the old idiom-be careful what you wish for. Now she will see the Trump administration in court."

Maine has become a flashpoint in the national debate over transgender athletes in girls and female sports since Trump vowed to withhold federal funding from any states that fail to comply with his “Keeping Men Out of Women’s Sports" executive order. Mills, a Democrat, has refused to comply with Trump's directive.

Trump has demanded a “full throated apology” from Mills and a promise not to "challenge" the federal government after a testy exchange between the two at a meeting of governors, where Mills told the president, "see you in court."

The proposed agreement would have required Maine to admit "liability" that it "engaged in wrongful or illegal activity in violation of Title IX in allowing the participation of male athletes in female-only high school sports in the state."

It would also require training for schools on their "obligations to ensure equal opportunity to female athletes under Title IX to participate in education programs and activities."