Under Maura Healey, the attorney general’s office sued the Trump administration nearly 100 times. Most of the time, she prevailed.

Former Maine attorney general James Tierney, now a Harvard Law lecturer, said the strategy of suing the federal government can have a big payoff for the states. It’s much easier, after all, to sue to prevent policy changes than to pass new laws through Congress.

’You get a big bang for your buck,’ said Tierney, a Democrat. ‘You can stop something bad happening or bring money into your state. You can get huge payback.’