'Retaliation!' GOP lawmaker lashes out after she's censured for 'reprehensible' post

A GOP state representative in Maine is suing the state's House Speaker and other Democrats, accusing them of violating her rights under the First Amendment and the Equal Protection, Due Process, and Guarantee Clauses, when they prohibited her from speaking or voting on the floor of the legislature, CNN reported.

That resolution was passed after Rep. Laurel Libby, who opposes the state's policy of allowing transgender athletes to participate in the sports league of their gender identity, "posted on social media to draw attention to the Maine high school girls’ indoor track and field state championship, where a student who competed as a boy last year but now identifies as transgender took first place in girls’ pole vault. That first-place finish propelled the student’s team to win the championship by a single point."

In response, the Maine House of Representatives, which has a Democratic majority, voted on party lines to declare her post “reprehensible” and “incompatible with her duty and responsibilities as a member of the House.”

The measure requires her to apologize to regain her speaking and voting privileges, which she refuses to do.

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Libby argues in her lawsuit that she was within her First Amendment rights, because "The Championship was a public event, was streamed online, and the names, schools and photographs of the winners were posted publicly."

She further told CNN, “I had no idea my post would go viral like it did, but it did because it so inherently unfair to see a young man on a podium that a Maine girl deserved to be standing on ... It’s so obvious my censure is retaliation because they do not want to have a debate about the real issue, which is biological males participating in girls’ sports.”

This particular incident was the catalyst for a public feud between President Donald Trump, who has issued an order prohibiting schools that receive federal funding from letting transgender athletes compete in their gender's division, and Maine Gov. Janet Mills, who responded to Trump's threats that "I am the federal law," by saying, "see you in court."

Trump has already ordered a Title IX investigation into the Maine Department of Education. The Trump administration also separately prohibited hospitals from registering Social Security Numbers to babies born in the state, although they later said this was a "mistake" and not related to Trump's fight with the governor, and ordered that decision be reversed.