Janet Mills, the Democratic governor of Maine, is facing a petition for her recall after sparring bitterly with Donald Trump at the White House last week on the issue of transgender rights.
The change.org petition, organized by local conservative activist Melissa Moulton, already has 12,362 of the 15,000 signatures it is seeking at the time of writing.
But there’s one big problem: Maine is one of 30 American states that does not have any provision to recall a governor.
Arguably the gesture still carries symbolic weight in registering the discontent of locals but it has no actual power to instigate change.
Mills – whose approval rating currently sits at 48 percent, according to Fox 23 Maine – is also being targeted by protesters taking part in a “March Against Mills” at the State Capitol in Augusta on Saturday afternoon, with Moulton again among the organizers.
The hostility has erupted in the wake of her viral clash with the president, which took place in the White House’s State Dining Room on Friday at a bipartisan event staged as part of the National Governors Association’s winter summit.
Trump had already threatened to withdraw federal funding from Maine at a Republican Governors Association dinner the previous evening over the state’s refusal to enforce his recent executive order prohibiting trans athletes from participating in women’s sports, prompting Mills to put out a statement declaring: “The state of Maine will not be intimidated by the president’s threats.”
Trump revived the matter the following morning and singled out the governor for criticism, asking her of his order: “Are you not going to comply with that?”
“I'm going to comply with state and federal law,” she answered.
"Well, I am – we are the federal law,” Trump responded testily.
“Well, you better do it. You better do it, because you're not going to get any federal funding at all if you don’t.
“And by the way, your population, even though it’s somewhat liberal, although I did very well there, your population doesn’t want men playing in women’s sports.
"So you better comply – because otherwise you're not getting any federal funding.”
Unruffled, Mills retorted: “I’ll see you in court.”
“Good, I’ll see you in court,” Trump snapped back. “I look forward to that. That should be a real easy one. And enjoy your life after, governor, ’cause I don’t think you’ll be in elected politics.”
Maine’s most famous resident, the best-selling horror novelist Stephen King, was among those leaping to Mills’s defense over the exchange.
“Makes me proud to be a Maine man,” he wrote on X. “Thank you, governor, for standing up to the bully.”
The Department of Education’s civil rights division has since announced a Title IX investigation into Maine’s Department of Education over the matter, prompting another statement from Mills in which she pointed out that withholding federal funding would be unconstitutional.
“In America, the president is neither a king nor a dictator, as much as this one tries to act like it – and it is the rule of law that prevents him from being so,” she added, making pointed reference to some of Trump’s recent social media offerings.
