Aseries of controversies in recent years have tested the line between two fundamental American values: the right of the people to elect their own representatives, and the power and duty of legislative bodies to police the conduct of their own members. In none of those controversies, however, was a legislator disciplined solely for speech — until now. The Democratic majority in the Maine House of Representatives, on a party-line vote, has stripped Representative Laurel Libby not only of her right to speak on the floor, but of her right to vote in the chamber, leaving her constituents effectively unrepresented. It did this solely to punish Libby, a Republican, for dissenting from the Democratic Party line on transgender athletes in women’s and girls’ sports. This is an outrage, and it should be treated as an outrage by the people who were screaming from the rafters at far less egregious steps taken in 2023 by the Republican majorities in Tennessee and Montana.
The Supreme Court has been asked to step in to Libby’s case, but thus far Justice Ketanji Brown Jackson has slow-walked the emergency application, sitting on it for three days and then yesterday asking for a response to be filed by next Thursday, May 8 — after the Maine house reconvenes for a floor session on Tuesday to consider measures such as the state budget and a proposed amendment to the state constitution. Jackson is thus running interference for the Maine Democrats to hold votes before the full Court can even consider Libby’s application.
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