AUBURN, Maine — Some state lawmakers are calling on Gov. Janet Mills to call the Legislature into a special session next month to deal with the consequences of the ongoing federal government shutdown.
The governor, who is running in next year’s Democratic U.S. Senate primary, repeated Thursday that she is discussing “all options” with legislative leaders but made no commitments. She has put the onus on President Donald Trump to end the shutdown that began on Oct. 1, while Republicans have said she should ask Senate Democrats to end their holdout.
But calls for a special session have risen out of the back-and-forth arguments. One Democratic lawmaker, two candidates running to replace Mills and a smattering of advocacy groups say the situation demands a special session, though party leaders have not embraced them. Large effects are looming with food stamp benefits and heating aid not being paid on Saturday.
Either Mills or a two-thirds majority of lawmakers in each chamber can call for a special session to tackle a specific issue. The current calls for a special session revolve mostly around the Trump administration citing the shutdown in letting benefits through the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program lapse at the beginning of November.
Sen. Rick Bennett, the former Republican from Oxford who is running as an independent for governor in 2026, called Wednesday for Mills to convene a special session on Nov. 14 “to assess the unmet need and make sure no Mainer goes hungry.” Bennett noted the Maine Senate is already slated to meet that Friday to hold confirmation votes.
“It is something I would do as governor without hesitation,” Bennett told the BDN. “Our neighbors are at risk.”
Senate President Mattie Daughtry, D-Brunswick, stopped short of calling for a special session Thursday and instead put the onus on Congress while blaming the Trump administration for “a deliberate punishment and attack on states.”
House Speaker Ryan Fecteau, D-Biddeford, said he will support holding a special session “if the shutdown persists” and if House Minority Leader Billy Bob Faulkingham, R-Winter Harbor, and Senate Minority Leader Trey Stewart, R-Presque Isle, commit to supporting a bill “to cover food assistance for kids, families and seniors.”
“I can tell you Democrats will absolutely support funding the Trump-imposed shortfall,” Fecteau added.
Stewart said there was “no need” for a special session. Both he and Faulkingham continued to focus on Mills and her campaign support from U.S. Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer, D-New York, whose caucus has voted down Republican efforts to fund the government over Democrats wanting to extend health insurance tax credits expiring this year.
“Gov. Mills needs to have a direct conversation with Schumer and demand they step up and do their job,” Faulkingham said.
On a tour of Good Shepherd Food Bank in Auburn on Thursday, Mills said Faulkingham should talk to Trump, Rollins and others in the administration “and tell them to put an end to this.”
“This problem can be solved in five minutes with the stroke of a pen,” Mills said.
The governor and the John T. Gorman Foundation said Wednesday they are releasing $1.25 million to Maine’s food assistance programs, which covers a little more than a day’s worth of the SNAP benefits that more than 170,000 Mainers receive each month.
Mills and Democratic governors from 19 other states also sent Trump a letter Wednesday asking him to release the nearly $6 billion in contingency funds that Congress set aside to support SNAP, while attorneys general from Maine and other states have filed a lawsuit to try to force Trump to release that money.
Mills acknowledged the state’s short-term infusion of cash for food assistance programs is not enough amid Maine residents otherwise normally receiving about $29 million in monthly SNAP benefits, with the average family of four getting $572. That has led lawmakers from different sides of the ideological spectrum to argue a special session is needed.
Former Maine Senate President Troy Jackson, D-Allagash, who is running for governor next year, said he would support a special session that makes use of the state’s rainy day fund. Three advocacy organizations — the anti-hunger Full Plates, Full Potential and the liberal Maine Equal Justice and Maine Center for Economic Policy — used a joint news release to say the “all-hands-on-deck moment” requires a special session.
Sen. Craig Hickman, D-Winthrop, a farmer who sponsored Maine’s right-to-food constitutional amendment, made a similar special session pitch in a Wednesday letter to Mills, Fecteau and Daughtry.
“Hoping that the courts will force the federal government to release emergency funding or praying donations to food banks can keep up with the need is simply not enough,” Hickman wrote.
