Rep. Anne-Marie Mastraccio (D-Sanford) took to Facebook last month to declare Sanford Police Chief Eric Small, in her words, unfit to serve as the city’s top law enforcer after he came out against Medicaid-funded transgender treatments as part of his Republican campaign to unseat Rep. Chellie Pingree.
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“If you were trans, would you feel protected?” asked Rep. Mastraccio, speaking with the Sanford Springvale News, “As a public servant you [Small] represent everybody. You are the police chief; you have to represent everybody.”
According to Small, Mastraccio’s now-deleted comments came in response to an August post where he argued that “transgender-affirming care” is not a proper use of taxpayer funds. In the post, Small did not even criticize transgenderism generally; he simply raised concerns about the use of taxpayer dollars to fund it.
“As a proud advocate for fiscal responsibility, I believe our tax dollars should be spent on priorities that benefit all Mainers, public safety, infrastructure, and supporting families. Transgender-affirming care, while an important issue for some, should not be funded by taxpayers,” said Small.
According to Small, that post was enough for Mastraccio to claim that he is unfit to serve as Sanford’s Chief of Police. Small argued that he has a First Amendment right to express his views as part of his CD1 political campaign and that he has followed all Sanford policies while keeping his campaign and police position separate.
“As everyone here knows, I’m a police officer — but nowhere on my personal political page do I use my title or leverage my position. I keep the two completely separate. I am following all city policies,” he said.
“Because I expressed my opinion, Maine State Representative Anne-Marie Mastraccio decided to personally attack me. Not for anything I’ve done in my role, but simply because I disagree with her. How can anyone run for U.S. Congress if they can’t exercise their First Amendment rights on their own time? I don’t believe in liberal policies — but I believe in liberals’ right to hold them,” he added.
Small also accused Mastraccio of conspiring with unnamed others to have him fired, though The Maine Wire could not independently verify that claim.
“Mastraccio has implied I’m unfit for my current office and, in my view, is working with others to have me fired. This is exactly the kind of political censorship the Democrats claim they oppose,” said Small.
Mastraccio appears to have deleted her comments, but Small preserved two of them in screenshots, though neither explicitly addresses his stance on transgenderism.
“I have lost all respect for you and your ability to do the job you were hired to do in Sanford. Run for Congress, run for anything you want, exercise your first amendment rights but you are not the right man for this job any longer,” she said.
In her other screenshotted comment, Mastraccio criticized Small for supporting President Donald Trump’s use of the National Guard to prevent crime in Washington, D.C., and promised that she would no longer visit his campaign page.
“Wow, just wow. I am speechless at your acceptance of this illegal autocratic takeover of DC police. Where were you when he incited violence in our Capitol on January 6th and as president refused to call in the National Guard,” she said
“I think I know who you are now and I do not believe you should be our police Chief. I won’t visit or comment on this page again, as you suggest, but you should choose to step down before you ruin a good police department,” she added.
Neither preserved comment accuses Small of any actual misconduct that would endanger the police department or the citizens it protects.
