Washington — A member of Maine’s House of Representatives is asking the Supreme Court for emergency relief after she was censured for criticizing the state for allowing transgender athletes at public high schools to participate in girls sports.
Laurel Libby, a Republican who represents the state’s House District 90, asked the high court to issue an injunction that would require the chamber’s clerk to count her votes. She argued that her constituents are being disenfranchised as a result of the punishment imposed on her for refusing to apologize after she was censured by the state House in a party-line vote last month.
“Without emergency relief from this court, Maine House District 90’s residents are without equal representation for the rest of their chosen legislator’s term,” lawyers for Libby wrote in their emergency appeal to the Supreme Court.
They said that the sanctions imposed by Maine’s House speaker leave her constituents “without a voice or vote for every bill coming to the House floor for the rest of her elected term, which runs through 2026.” Libby was first elected to the state legislature in 2020.
The dispute stems from a post Libby shared to Facebook in February that called attention to a transgender athlete who placed first in the girls’ pole vault at the state’s track-and-field championship. In Maine, transgender students are eligible to participate in athletics in accordance with their gender identity. The Justice Department filed a civil lawsuit against Maine’s Department of Education earlier this month over its policy, which it says discriminates against women in violation of Title IX. The lawsuit came after President Trump signed an executive order in February barring transgender girls and women from competing on sports teams that align with their gender identity.
In response to Libby’s post, which included photos and the name of the athlete, a minor, the Maine House voted 75 to 70 to censure her. The censure resolution stated that Libby refused to remove her post after she was warned it may endanger the athlete and said “it is a basic tenet of politics and good moral character that children should not be targeted by adult politicians, especially when that targeting could result in serious harm.”
The resolution also directed Libby to “accept full responsibility for the incident and publicly apologize to the House and to the people of the state of Maine.” Libby, it concluded, “must comport herself in a manner that pursues the highest standards of legislative conduct.”
After the censure resolution was approved, Libby was brought to the well of the House chamber and directed to apologize. When she refused to do so, the speaker found her in violation of a Maine House rule that prohibits a member guilty of a violation of the legislature’s rules and orders from voting or speaking “until the member has made satisfaction.”
Since then, roll call votes denote a “Z” for Libby’s district. Her lawyers have said her seat has not had a vote on the state’s budget or on bills Libby sponsored herself.
Libby and six of her constituents filed a lawsuit in federal court to have her vote restored, alleging violations of the Constitution, including the First Amendment. A federal district court declined to provide her with preliminary relief, finding that legislative immunity precluded it because her sanction by Maine’s House speaker was a legislative act, and the disenfranchisement of her district’s voters could not overcome that immunity.
The U.S. Court of Appeals for the First Circuit also rejected a request to order the clerk to count Lobby’s votes.
In her request for the Supreme Court’s intervention, Libby’s lawyers said the relief they are seeking would restore “the status quo of equal representation, bringing the Maine House back into conformity with every other state and Congress.”
They have asked the high court to weigh in by May 6, when the House will convene for another floor session, or hear oral arguments on her request next month.
“Without this court’s intervention, District 90’s residents have no equal representation in the House — indefinitely,” they said. “And there is no political solution for defendants’ unconstitutional acts.”
Libby’s lawyers said she remains the representative for District 90 with “no constitutional mechanism to restore her vote unless, contrary to our most basic First Amendment freedoms, she recants her views to the speaker’s liking.”
