The Debate Over Trans Rights Is Heating Up in Maine for the 2026 Election Cycle

Republicans who campaigned on restricting transgender rights lost key races in 2025, but Maine U.S. House candidate Paul LePage is still planning on using the anti-trans playbook in his race next year.

LePage, the state’s former governor and a Republican candidate for the seat currently held by retiring Rep. Jared Golden, has urged Maine residents to sign a petition to get a measure onto the ballot that would require sports teams, locker rooms and bathrooms in schools to be separated by biological sex, indicating that trans students would have to abide by the sex they were assigned at birth.

He’s also said he plans to emphasize blocking transgender athletes from sports teams aligned with their gender identity as a centerpiece of his campaign.

“The Governor supports efforts to protect the integrity of girls’ sports teams and keep them safe from harm,” Brent Littlefield, a strategist for the former governor, told NOTUS via text. “That means no biological males competing in girls’ sports.”

Republicans nationwide have escalated anti-trans messaging in their campaigns in recent elections. In Virginia’s races this year, for example, Republicans spent 57% of paid media on anti-trans ads. Whether trans girls should be allowed on girls’ sports teams has been the subject of ongoing debate in Maine: the Trump administration sued the state in April over its trans athlete policy and the matter has been considered by the Maine Legislature.

Trans student athletic policy is not a clear political winner for Republicans, as the 2025 races proved. And so far, only LePage seems to be truly leaning in to what some consider to be a distraction from other issues facing voters.

“Mainers are worried about healthcare and the cost of living,” said Harry Burke, campaign manager for Democratic candidate Matt Dunlap, in a text to NOTUS. “This is a manufactured issue from Republicans. Paul LePage is only trying to distract from the fact that he cut healthcare for working class people so he could afford to give massive tax breaks to rich people.”

Fellow Democratic candidate Jordan Wood gave a more direct statement of opposition to the petition.

“This referendum targets transgender kids and takes Maine backwards,” he told NOTUS in a statement. “Our laws already protect students from discrimination, and we should be upholding those protections — not rolling them back. Maine families want leaders focused on lowering costs, fixing childcare and healthcare, and strengthening our schools — not divisive political games that pit neighbor against neighbor and do nothing to improve lives in our state.”

Sen. Susan Collins, who is also up for reelection in 2026, is backing the petition, but not emphasizing it in the same way as LePage plans to.

She signed the petition Nov. 23, according to a Facebook post made by the Maine Republican Party. Her spokesperson told NOTUS she supports the petition based on her view of Title IX, “which provides opportunities for girls and women to compete in sports that they did not have prior to the passage of this landmark law.”

“That federal law makes distinctions on the basis of sex, not on the basis of gender identity, thus promoting fair competition,” the spokesperson continued. Collins “will not be involved in the state referendum campaign because, as a federal official, she does not advocate on state ballot issues,” they added.

Graham Platner, who is running for Senate in the Democratic primary, told News Center Maine he opposes the petition to get the referendum on the 2026 ballot.

“I do not think they should be banned. I think banning people from playing in sports in the gender that they see themselves as and identify as, doing that in a wholesale way is going to be restrictive of people’s rights. So, I do not think that banning is the answer,” Platner said in the interview.

Fellow Democratic Senate candidate Gov. Janet Mills has been quiet on the petition. Her campaign did not respond to a request for comment.

In the past, Mills has stated that the issue of trans girls in women’s sports is worthy of debate. She was outspoken against President Donald Trump’s executive order to bar trans women in women’s sports, saying that an executive order is not the appropriate way to change the law Mainers voted on.

“It’s a legislative policy that’s been enacted. If they wish to change it, they have the authority to change it, but you don’t change it by executive order or wishing it differently,” Mills told reporters in March. “It’s worthy of a debate — a full democratic debate.”

Mark Brewer, the chair of the Department of Political Science at the University of Maine, said Mills has always defended the Maine Human Rights Act — a law that prohibits discrimination on the basis of sexual orientation and gender identity — but has never said if she agrees with it.

“She also said that the question of whether trans girls should be allowed to participate on girls’ high school sports teams is very much one that should be up for debate,” he said. “So she hasn’t come right out and explicitly said where she stands, but she’s kind of signaling that, ‘My role as governor right now — I’m defending the law, but I’m not necessarily saying I support the law.’”

Brewer said he thinks Mills and other candidates will have to weigh in more extensively in the future.

“I suspect that this issue will become more and more prominent, and then the candidates will have to react to it,” he said.

Petition campaign spokesperson Heidi Sampson said the petition has received over 70,000 signatures. It needed about 68,000 by February to get the referendum on the November 2026 ballot.

LGBTQ+ advocacy groups will be following how the candidates stake their positions on the matter.

“Keeping tabs on who is speaking up, and in what ways, as well as who remains silent, will be something to watch closely from a potential policy perspective,” Kris Pitts, the executive director of MaineTransNet, said.

Gia Drew, the executive director of the LGTBQ+ rights group EqualityMaine, said in an email that the silence from Democrats doesn’t mean “they wouldn’t be completely against a ballot initiative.”

“I would imagine if the group gets the required signatures in February, then we’ll see and hear from other lawmakers, such as Democratic lawmakers/candidates in opposition to this initiative,” Drew said via email. “I would hope no one wants to roll back twenty years of Maine law and make schools less safe and welcoming to all kids, or be seen on the same side on this issue as our disgraceful president.”

Drew said she believes this is not an issue most Mainers “want their politicians spending their time and energy and money on.”

“So if those folks want to make this part of their campaign, it’s sad for those folks,” she said in an interview. “I’m not surprised by former Gov. LePage. He’s never been very supportive of our community, but it’s really unfortunate that Sen. Collins has gone down this path.”