Maine Gov. Janet Mills' confrontation with President Donald Trump garnered national attention last week.
During a White House event, Trump warned Mills that Maine would lose federal funding if she didn't comply with his executive order banning transgender female athletes from competing on girls' sports teams. Mills responded that she is complying with state and federal law — and would see him in court.
But how do state and federal laws actually protect transgender athletes?
"It's been 20 years that we've been protecting on the basis of gender identity. It's not new. It's not radical," says Kit Thomson Crossman, executive director of the Maine Human Rights Commission.
Thomson Crossman says gender identity was first included in the Maine Human Rights Act as part of the definition of sexual orientation in 2005. Four years ago, the law was amended to add gender identity as its own protected class, joining other protected classes such as sex, sexual orientation, disability, race, color and religion. The law specifically says that denying a person equal opportunity in athletic programs is education discrimination.
"So the Maine Human Rights Act protects trans students in the same the way it protects all other students," says Thomson Crossman. "So you have to have equal opportunity in their school athletic programs. Not special treatment, just equal access to participate if they want to."
To align with state law, the Maine Principals' Association updated its policy last year to allow students to participate in sports based on the gender they identify with.
Thomson Crossman says Maine's law on the issue solid, though they acknowledge there are disputes about federal law, specifically, Title IX.
"We are, right now, expecting schools to comply with the Maine Human Rights Act, and I think that's going to put them in conflict with Title IX," Thomson Crossman says. "And that's something that I'm sure we're going to be working out for a while."
Title IX prohibits sex-based discrimination in schools and programs that receive federal funding. President Trump cited the 53-year-old law when he issued his executive order, arguing that allowing transgender female athletes to compete denies equal opportunity for women and girls.
"We can sniff out discrimination where it exists. And that executive order smells really bad to me," says Jennifer Drobac, professor of law emerita at Indiana University.
Drobac says she believes there's no question that Title IX protects transgender athletes because the definition of sex has evolved and expanded to include gender identity.
"What happens to Title IX is that every time there's a new administration, they either try to undo or re-interpret what the law is according to their own political perspectives, which is their prerogative," Drobac says. "And then it's up to the courts to decide what the law actually says."
In 2016, the Obama administration issued guidance that clarified that Title IX protects students who are transgender. A year later, the Trump administration rescinded that guidance. Then, the Biden administration issued rules in 2024 that affirmed protections for transgender students. A federal judge in Kentucky struck down those rules in January. And President Trump issued his executive order a month later.
"I think what some would say is that no one is trying to deny trans students the right to play sports in general. Just women's sports," says Erin Buzuvis, a professor and associate dean at Western New England University School of Law.
"But it's not the right to play sports in general," Buzuvis says. "It's the right to play sports in a way that affirms your gender identity. Because cisgender students have that right."
Buzuvis says with the exception of the Trump administration's interpretations of Title IX, the law's arc has consistently moved in the direction of inclusion.
"I don't know that it's necessarily a weakness of Title IX but a weakness of society that we are carving out trans students and saying other people can find protection when it comes to discrimination on the basis of sex under the statute, but these students can't," Buzuvis says.
"This is just a flat out power play," says Ellen Staurowsky, a professor in sports media at Ithaca College who has spent her career studying Title IX. She says at its core, the law is a mandate for educators to support all students to fulfill their promise as humans.
"I'm 100% sure that that was not the original intention of Title IX or any other civil rights law, to use it as a weapon against the most vulnerable," says Staurowsky.
But the law will likely be tested — both in the courts and in Congress. Republican lawmakers have introduced bills in the US House and Senate that would make it a violation of Title IX to allow transgender female athletes to compete on girls and women's school sports teams.
