The Maine Principals’ Association (MPA) filed a motion late last month asking a federal judge to block a subpoena from the U.S. Department of Justice (DOJ) for MPA records, including sports team rosters.
“The subpoena served on the MPA should be quashed because it seeks documents that are irrelevant, disproportionate and impose an undue burden on a non-party that has merely complied with applicable state law,” said the MPA in court documents reviewed by the Portland Press Herald.
The subpoena comes as part of a lawsuit, filed in April, against the state of Maine over the refusal of MPA Gov. Janet Mills and the Maine Department of Education (MDOE) to bar transgender-identifying males from girls’ sports.
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The MPA successfully applied to have the list of the DOJ’s subpoena demands sealed, so the full list of demands is not clear.
According to the MPA’s request for the subpoena to be quashed, the DOJ is requesting “rosters of all students playing interscholastic sports in the state of Maine, MPA organizational charts, as well as ‘all complaints, concerns, praise, or reports received by the MPA’ from any individual in the state of Maine.”
The MPA argued in its filing that the DOJ’s request is seeking irrelevant information and that the request places an undue burden on the MPA, which, as a non-profit rather than a part of the MDOE, is not technically the target of the lawsuit.
“The subpoena at issue here improperly seeks to shift the focus to the practical effects of the state law on a private organization and individuals within the state—matters that are not relevant to the legal question of preemption,” said the MPA.
DOJ attorney Matthew Donnelly submitted a formal response to the MPA’s request last Wednesday, arguing that the information requested from the MPA is highly relevant to its lawsuit against Maine for violating the federal government’s interpretation of Title IX antidiscrimination laws.
He pointed out that, while the MPA is not the subject of the lawsuit, the MDOE has allowed it to take on responsibility for school sports across the state.
“The Defendant Maine Department of Education has effectively ceded its responsibility for interscholastic athletics over to the MPA, which means that the MPA possesses a vast amount of highly relevant evidence,” said Donnelly.
The DOJ finally sued the MDOE in April after a months-long feud between President Donald Trump and Gov. Janet Mills, who refused to comply with the president’s executive order, “Keeping Men Out of Women’s Sports.”
“We believe they are failing to protect women, and it’s not only an issue in sports, it is a public safety issue. These boys are allowed to go in women’s restrooms, they are allowed to go in the women’s dressing rooms and get fully naked and change, biological boys, and change clothes in front of theses young women,” said Attorney General Pam Bondi when announcing the suit.
The lawsuit seeks an injunction against Maine that would compel the state to comply with President Trump’s order and would require Maine to retroactively award-winning titles to girls who lost in competitions to male athletes.
