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Removal Of Referendum · Newsradio WGAN

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  State channel Bellows decided on Tuesday to remove the referendum
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  question to protect girls, sports and spaces from Novembers
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  ballot after previously determining that it could appear
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  following challenges to the legitimate of its signatures.
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  Quote, citizens initiatives are direct democracy.
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  Just as we take voting security seriously, we take petition
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  integrity seriously, said Bellows in a statement provided
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  to the Portland Press Herald. Unfortunately, some out of state
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  circulators failed to meet certain legal requirements for
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  petitions, resulting in this initiative failing to qualify
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  for the ballot after legal review.
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  I am proud of the hard work and dedication that the Secretary of
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  State staff who worked so hard to safeguard our elections for
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  the benefit of every Maine voter.
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  She added Bellow's ruling placed her stamp of approval on an
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  official recommendation that she reject the ballot referendum.
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  Her decision will now return to The Maine Superior Court for
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  approval, where the ballot question committee Maine Girl
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  Dads will have a final chance to keep their initiative on the
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  ballot. The Superior Court will either
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  uphold Bellow's decision, remanded for further
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  consideration, or overturn her decision and place the petition
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  on the ballot. Petitioners will have the
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  opportunity to gather more signatures if the court upholds
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  the decision. That would allow them to
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  potentially put the question on the ballot in 2027, not 2026.
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  After announcing the decision, Bellows gave a press conference
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  where she explained that she believes 2 out of state petition
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  circulators gathering signatures failed to follow Maine law, thus
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  invalidating the signatures that they collected.
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  Bellows refused to take a question from The Maine Wire
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  during the conference, though she took questions from other
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  news outlets. The initiative, officially
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  titled An Act to Designate School Sports Participation in
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  Facilities by Sex, would have allowed Mainers to vote on
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  whether or not they want to bar males from girls sports and
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  private spaces such as bathrooms and locker rooms.
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  Recent polling from Pan Atlantic found that voters would have
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  supported the referendum by a a roughly 10 point margin.
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  In March, Bellows actually had ruled that Maine Girl Dads had
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  submitted 71,033 valid signatures exceeding the
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  required number of 67,682 and that their referendum could
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  appear on the ballot. And to clearly describe this for
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  you, by the way the process and how it works and what you think
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  about all this, here's what the Secretary of State's office
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  basically does when those petition signatures are given to
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  them. It's it's a difficult thing to
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  collect signatures, right? So you give a whole bunch of
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  people who are able to do it and there's got a certain, you know,
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  there's certain rules about who can and why and how and all that
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  stuff. But let's set that, set that
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  aside for a minute and just focus on what they do.
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  They all get these sheets and they walk around and they ask
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  people like you to sign them. So Danny has a sheet, I have a
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  sheet, Jason Taylor has a sheet, you know, any John Smith has a
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  sheet. And they all start running
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  around and asking people to sign stuff.
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  And they sign, you know, basically usually by the town
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  they live in. And they have different sheets
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  for all those. And it's, it's a very complex
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  process. But what happens when Circulator
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  Danny and Circulator Matt are both running around, say, in the
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  town of South Portland, where we happen to be sitting right now?
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  And you know, Monday Danny approached somebody who on
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  Wednesday I approached 2 and we both asked that person to sign.
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  The person doesn't really recognize they can't sign it
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  twice or that they shouldn't or that it's a different petition
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  or whatever. And they signed both of them.
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  Now two pieces of paper have the same name on it.
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  So the Secretary of State's office gets this big pile of
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  signatures and names and they go through them to essentially
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  check it against the voter rolls, to make sure that they
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  are a registered voter of the state and to make sure that
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  there are not duplicates or mistakes or whatever else.
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  That's what they did in March. The Secretary of State,
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  Secretary of State's office went through all these and said,
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  look, after we throw out the duplicates, after we throw out
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  the mistakes, after we throw out the problems, after we throw out
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  all the stuff that we need to throw out, we have 71,033
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  leftover. That's the number.
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  So that was, well, that was 4000 or so above the number that they
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  needed. Then the challenges happen.
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  And that's where this contention has been, has been OK.
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  The people who are opposed to this being on the ballot and are
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  terrified of it being on the ballot, I think there's a,
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  there's an element of the politics of this we have to
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  discuss, which is that the people who are opposed to this,
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  I think are fairly convinced that it would pass.
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  And it would probably pass because it's at this point what
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  people have decided. I mean, in 2023 maybe, you know,
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  maybe early 2024, you could have made a case for people still
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  being confused about this. But 2024-2025 and now in the
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  2026, common sense has taken over.
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  I mean, it's very rare that you talk to somebody today about
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  this particular issue and anyone legitimately defends the idea of
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  a trans athlete who happens to have been biologically male and
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  still is, thank you very much, biologically male who is
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  transitioning to be a girl or identifies as a girl or
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  whatever. Very few people that I have met
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  in the past two years think that it is wise, safe, good, smart,
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  or otherwise appropriate for that individual to compete in
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  female sports for a variety of reasons that have nothing to do
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  with discrimination, anti trans bias, or anything else like
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  that. The first and most obvious one
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  is competitive balance. When you have biology, which
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  gives the average male significantly more height,
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  significantly more strength, significantly more speed at on
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  average, then the likelihood of that individual being taller,
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  stronger, faster than most if not all of the females that they
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  would compete against is very high.
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  It might not always be true, but it is an extremely high
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  likelihood. And we've seen that of course
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  play out in track, we've seen that play out in swimming, we've
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  seen that play out in a lot of sports.
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  So that the competitive balance is the first one.
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  Obviously you do not really want to introduce a inherent
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  biological competitive advantage to something whereby you're
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  supposed to be competing on reasonably even terms with with
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  like competitors. That's really what
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  categorization's about anyway. I mean, why do we, why do we
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  even have boys and girls sports? Like why don't we just have
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  sports? When you have a track meet, why
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  don't you just go run and then see where the chips fall?
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  You know you don't because if you did that, no girl would win
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  anything on most sports. I mean, there's some sports
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  where this is less of an issue, but on things where strength,
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  speed and length and everything really matters, which is most
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  sports, most competitive things that you would actually see, it
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  matters. And so you want to ensure that
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  you are, you are categorizing athletes in a way that would
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  allow them to compete fairly against other athletes of type.
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  It's the, it's, you know, we have age groupings too.
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  It's not just about sex, it's about age.
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  I mean, there's a reason why a middle school kid does not
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  compete against high school kids, why they don't play in the
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  same leagues, why they don't play in the same divisions, why
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  the classifications different. It's the same thing.
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  They're just smaller, less physically developed, and they
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  would lose. All right, let's go to the
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  phones. As I promised, Arthur was
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  patient and waited through that break.
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  So let's talk to Arthur. Sir, how are you?
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  Good morning, Matt. Morning.
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  Has Shannon Bellows not stepped made a misstep here?
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  Consider this. Has she made a misstep?
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  You mean? Is that a?
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  Misstep because if if she makes it to the general, there is so
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  many people that are in agreement on this issue does not
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  not affect her people be willing to vote for or any of the
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  Democrat nominees once they get to the general and they're asked
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  about this issue. There are so many people that
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  have feel they've been disenfranchised and this is the
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  third referendum in a row where people have been.
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  We had the power line referendum where people were denied the
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  rights. We have the right ID to vote
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  which people were disenfranchised by the way the
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  way it was worded. And now we have another
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  referendum where people have been denied their rights.
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  Does this not hurt the Democrats?
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  Will it not awaken some people and say, hey, I'm going to vote
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  Republican this time because on this is an important issue to me
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  and these people have have taken away our rights?
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  Well, I suppose the answer to that is it depends, Arthur,
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  because it's not going to be on the ballot.
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  So there won't be that reminder on the ballot that says, hey, by
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  the way, these people didn't care what you think.
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  What's going to matter is whether or not the Republican
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  candidate, whether Rick Bennett, although Rick Bennett's on the
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  other side of this issue. So probably not.
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  But if anybody holds them accountable, like is there any
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  ads run on this? I mean, you know, in the 2024
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  election, Trump's rather famously ran the you know,
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  Kamala is not for you. She's for they them ad and it
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  was quite successful that particular year.
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  Does this candidate this time run something like this against
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  her? It's sitting there waiting to be
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  exploited though is to the point you're making.
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  Are there? Was such a significant
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  population of people that support this referendum and
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  they're not just the people that signed it, but many other
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  people, does this not awaken those people that we are in a
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  liberal experiment? Well, I would be.
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  Progressive Liberal Laboratory I.
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  Would be bewildered if you didn't already know that That's
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  if you're one of these people out there.
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  But yes, they should. But again, I think it comes down
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  to this. One thing is if let's just say
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  the Republican candidate, whoever they are, doesn't really
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  mention it, doesn't make it part of their campaign, doesn't talk
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  about it, that sentiment will exist out there.
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  But like, it's really hard for a voter to put it into action if
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  they're not given marching orders, if there's not a flag to
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  grab and and run up the hill. And I'm worried that it won't be
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  politically exploited to the degree that it can and should
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  be. Right.
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  And even if the even if the candidates on the on the
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  Republican side do use the issue, will it be reported in
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  the liberal news? Media.
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  Yeah, that's, that's a certain no.
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  Of course it won't be. But that doesn't mean it doesn't
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  get out there. I think that the the the power
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  of the liberal media in Maine is basically gone right now.
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  And thanks for the call, Arthur. Appreciate it.
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  So I'm not sure that I care that they don't cover it because
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  nobody reads the Press Herald anyway.
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  No offense if you're a Press Herald reporter.
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  They just don't.