Mennonites in Dexter are leaving Maine for religious reasons after the Bureau of Motor Vehicles (BMV), headed by Secretary of State Shenna Bellows, refused an accommodation that would allow them to avoid violating their religious objections to commercial insurance.
Mark Nolt, a Mennonite father of 13 living in Dexter, spoke with The Maine Wire on Wednesday about his decision to leave the state along with other members of his religious community.
“We’ve been working with the state now for six-and-a-half years on that, and just finally chose to give up and move out of state to be able to hold to our convictions,” Nolt told The Maine Wire.
Nolt explained that their troubles with Maine’s state government stem from their religious prohibition on commercial insurance, including vehicle insurance, which Maine requires.
Mennonites eschew commercial insurance for a few reasons, he explained, including a belief that they should rely on their own community for support rather than on outside corporations. According to Nolt, they also believe that insurance takes away from trust in God and leads to a more careless outlook on life.
They also oppose insurance contracts that would require them to enter into lawsuits in the event that the insurance company chose to do so, because they believe that Jesus taught not to engage in lawsuits.
Despite the state’s requirement to have vehicle insurance, Nolt said that the Mennonites only began to have problems with the state around six and a half years ago, around the time Gov. Janet Mills (D-Maine) became governor and Bellows became Secretary of State.
Nolt said the problem began when his brother-in-law, also a Mennonite, got into a small vehicle crash. He stated that the Mennonite community settled with the other party quickly, but that the incident sparked their troubles with the state, which now demands that Mennonites obtain commercial vehicle insurance against their religious convictions.
Some states provide religious accommodations for Mennonite communities to self-insure or make another agreement with the state to avoid dealing with commercial insurance.
Nolt told the Maine Wire that his family and most of his community are planning to move to Kentucky, where they have an agreement in place that would allow the state to seize some of their land to settle claims if they are unable to do so themselves.
He said that the guarantee implicit in this agreement has never needed to be tested because the Mennonite community simply settles any claims made against them.
Maine does have one exception that allows an individual to avoid vehicle insurance; however, according to Nolt, it is prohibitively expensive.
According to Maine law, a person can deposit money with the Secretary of State to be used in case of a crash, in lieu of insurance, but that sum must meet the same threshold as the minimum amount accepting insurance would cover, which is an exorbitant $177,500.
In addition, that money remains with the Secretary of State for six full years even after the deposit has been canceled.
Rep. Steve Foster (R-Dexter) has repeatedly put forward legislation to allow his Mennonite constituents to self-insure and continue to live by their religious beliefs.
Foster’s most recent attempt was voted down in May by just two votes after Bellows vehemently opposed the bill and testified against it during its public hearing.
She even claimed that Rep. Foster’s bill would require her office to hire six new employees and would cost the state over $1.8 million in the 2025-2026 fiscal year alone.
Prior to his departure, Nolt is holding a public auction on Saturday, October 18, to sell off some of his farming equipment, maple syrup production gear, household appliances, tools, and even livestock.
Despite the Mennonites’ decision to leave Maine, Nolt told The Maine Wire that he hopes the state will eventually establish a religious exception to its insurance requirements that would allow them, or others who share their beliefs, to return.
“We want to just trust the Lord in it all,” said Nolt.
