It was heartbreaking to read incarcerated women’s accounts of the sexual harassment and threats they say they’ve endured since Maine began housing biological males who identify as transgender in women’s prison (“Maine women inmates accuse transgender prisoner of harassment,” March 4).

In 2021, when Maine legislators passed the law allowing inmates to be housed by gender identity rather than by sex at birth, I wrote a Sun Journal op-ed (“New prison law endangers women’s safety, privacy“) in which I noted that that the change made no exceptions for violent convicts such as sex offenders or murderers, nor were males required to have sex reassignment surgery before being housed with women. No legislator at the public hearing I viewed expressed concern for female inmates’ safety.

As I wrote then: “Believing that incarcerated males instantly cease to be a threat to women if they identify as women themselves requires an astonishing level of both naivete and disregard for the women caged with them.”

If such inmates are at risk in men’s prison, provide them with a secure unit in the male estate. Why must female inmates (86% of whom report having experienced sexual violence in their lifetime, according to one study) live in fear of sharing their showers or the people they sleep beside?

It’s particularly disheartening that incarcerated women’s cries for help have been met with silence from groups such as Maine Women’s Lobby and ACLU of Maine, both of which supported the 2021 law. Once again, they are prioritizing the rights and safety of another group over the rights and safety of vulnerable women.

Jennifer Gingrich
Co-director, New England Women’s Solidarity
Portland