The Trump administration suffered a blow on Friday after a judge issued a temporary injunction preventing it from slashing Maine’s federal school lunch funding in a bid to force the state to ban transgender students from competing in girls’ sports.
Newsweek contacted the Department of Agriculture, which oversees the policy, and the Department of Education for comment on Saturday via email outside regular office hours.
Why It Matters
President Donald Trump campaigned against the inclusion of transgender participants in women’s sports ahead of the 2024 presidential election, and in early February, he signed an executive order instructing federal bodies to penalize schools that allow this.
He also issued executive orders that said the U.S. government recognized only two genders, male and female, and prevented transgender personnel from serving in the military—though a federal judge blocked the latter.
MANDEL NGAN/AFP/GETTY
What To Know
On April 2, the Department of Agriculture informed Maine that it would lose federal funding for programs providing free or cut-price meals to children after the state refused to block transgender students from girls’ sports, which the Trump administration argued was a violation of Title IX’s sex discrimination rules.
The move followed a tempestuous meeting between the president and Maine Governor Janet Mills, a Democrat, on February 21. In the meeting, the president warned that the state would lose funding if it did not enforce his executive order related to transgender students in sport. Mills replied: “We’re going to follow the law sir. We’ll see you in court.”
On Friday, District Judge John Woodcock Jr. imposed a temporary restraining order banning the Department of Agriculture from “freezing, terminating, or otherwise interfering with the state of Maine’s future federal funding for alleged violations of Title IX.”
In a March 31 letter, the Department of Education asked Maine to approve a Title IX agreement barring transgender students from girls’ sports. The state rejected the agreement on Friday, with the Maine Attorney General’s Office saying: “We will not sign the Resolution Agreement, and we do not have revisions to counter purpose. We agree that we are at an impasse.”
Friday also saw the Department of Education announce that it was seeking approval from the Justice Department for “enforcement action” against Maine over its policy on transgender students in sport, which could result in all federal funding for the state’s schools being cut.
What People Are Saying
District Judge John Woodcock Jr. said in his ruling: “During the pendency of this Temporary Restraining Order, the United States Department of Agriculture and Secretary of Agriculture Brooke L. Rollins 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.”
Craig Trainor, the acting assistant secretary for civil rights at the Department of Education, said in a news release: “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.
“The Maine Department of Education will now have to defend its discriminatory practices before a Department administrative law judge and in a federal court against the Justice Department. 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.”
What Happens Next
Friday’s ruling is a temporary pause. The case is set to appear in court for broader consideration “at a date and time convenient to the parties.”
