Published May 6, 2025
The people of Maine’s 90th district are currently without representation in their House of Representatives. This is because their representative, Laurel Libby, has been censured by the body for speaking out against trans high school athletics, and in Maine this means she can be prohibited from speaking or voting in the legislature until she apologizes. This outrage is in litigation, but no resolution seems to be forthcoming.
It’s an outrage because Representative Libby was duly elected and yet can’t do her job. She hasn’t been, say, expelled for breaking the rules of the body. Instead she’s being coerced into changing her views. It thus is an affront to her free speech rights and the rights of her constituents to representation.
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Michael A. Fragoso is a fellow at the Ethics and Public Policy Center in the Constitution, the Courts, and the Culture Program, where he writes and speaks on issues relating to the law, the federal judiciary, and Congress. His writing has appeared in The Wall Street Journal, National Review, The Harvard Journal of Law & Public Policy: Per Curiam, and elsewhere.
