Maine Gov. Janet Mills has been formally notified that her state is out of compliance with Title IX and will face the lack of federal funds and worse.
This week, a federal investigation decided that the Maine Division of Schooling (MDOE) violated the rights of feminine athletes below its cost.
The discover was addressed to Maine Gov. Janet Mills and state Lawyer Common Aaron Frey.
Neither Mills nor Frey responded to a request for remark.
The willpower of violation was made 4 days after a extensively publicized alternate over males in girls’s sports activities between Mills and President Donald Trump at a Feb. 21 White Home assembly with the nation’s governors.
After Trump referred to as Mills out for her defiance and threatened to chop off federal funds, the Maine governor affirmed her opposition to Title IX coverage and stated she would see him in court docket.
In line with Archeval, the federal investigation was initiated, by way of its implementation of laws for Title IX of the Schooling Amendments of 1972.
Title IX prohibits discrimination on the idea of intercourse in any instructional program or exercise that receives federal monetary help, partially, stating: “No particular person shall, on the idea of intercourse, be excluded from participation in, be denied the advantages of, be handled in another way from one other particular person or in any other case be discriminated towards in any interscholastic, intercollegiate, membership or intramural athletics provided by a recipient (of federal funds).”
On Jan. 9, the federal court docket vacated the Biden-era rule.
Proof of Non-Compliance
Archeval wrote that the Workplace for Civil Rights investigation discovered that on Feb. 17, 2025, Greely Excessive Faculty violated Title IX “by way of the participation of a male athlete in a girls’s highschool observe meet.”
The Maine state capitol constructing in Augusta, Maine, on this file picture. Josh Lintz/FormulaNone
The letter additionally cited that Maine Coast Waldorf, a public highschool, violated Title IX by way of the participation of a male athlete in a girls’s highschool ski occasion on Feb. 18 and 19.
States’ Rights Versus Federal Supremacy
Institutional insurance policies and sure state legal guidelines in Maine that battle with Trump’s govt order and the Title IX guidelines put forth by the Trump administration had been highlighted in Archeval’s letter.
Archeval famous that the Maine Principals’ Affiliation (MPA) is the governing physique for youth sports activities within the state and that each one public excessive colleges, in addition to various personal colleges, are MPA members.
Archeval additionally cited the Maine Human Rights Act, which states, “The chance for a person at an academic establishment to take part in all instructional, counseling and vocational steerage applications, all apprenticeship and on-the-job coaching applications and all extracurricular actions with out discrimination due to intercourse, sexual orientation or gender id, a bodily or psychological incapacity, ancestry, nationwide origin, race, colour or faith is acknowledged and declared to be a civil proper.”
Mike Burnham, govt director of the MPA, has acknowledged that the MPA is dedicated to following state regulation on gender id.
Porter stated the MDOE memo harassed that colleges are anticipated to abide by the Maine Human Rights Act, and within the case of athletics, the MPA has adopted the place to comply with state regulation.
The problem of federal funding of faculty districts rests with the state and never native districts, Porter stated.
“After a federal court docket vacated the 2024 guidelines final month, the brand new federal steerage reinforces compliance with the 2020 guidelines, which we’re re-adopting,” he stated.
Other than the potential loos of federal funding, Archeval informed Mills and Frey that if compliance from the MDOE is just not forthcoming, he could ship a referral to the Division of Justice.