by Sharon Rondeau
(Sep. 3, 2026) — In mid-July, the non-profit We the Patriots USA filed a lawsuit against the state of Maine challenging its 2021 law revoking its religious exemption for compulsory vaccines for school attendance.
An eighth-grader was “informed that he could not return to school to start eighth grade this fall because he has not received certain vaccinations required by state law,” We the Patriots wrote on its website on July 16. “The family objects to receiving those vaccines on religious grounds. But since Maine abolished the religious exemption for school vaccinations in 2021, the school refused to honor the family’s religious beliefs…”
There remain five states without religious vaccine exemptions: Maine, Connecticut, New York, West Virginia and California. The Maine case was reported by the Bangor Daily News and Maine Public.
The July 14, 2026 complaint claims a civil-rights violation on the part of the school district based on the “First Amendment’s Free Exercise Clause Right To Direct Children’s Religious Upbringing” (p. 10). The suit references Mahmoud v. Taylor, a 2025 U.S. Supreme Court decision upholding parents’ rights to opt out of instruction they deem objectionable to their “sincere beliefs” practiced at home.
The WTPUSA further explains:
“…With this lawsuit, we now have active litigation to win back the religious exemption for school vaccinations in all three circuits where it was abolished by state law: the Ninth (which includes California), the Second (which includes New York and Connecticut), and the First (which includes Maine). When we told you we were “taking them ALL on” because religious freedom shouldn’t depend on your zip code, we meant it. And with this lawsuit, We The Patriots USA has positioned itself on the forefront of the battle to win back religious liberty for families from coast to coast, who should never have to choose between their faith and an education for their children.”
On Thursday morning, WTPUSA vice president and co-founder Brian Festa and Attorney Cameron Atkinson, the latter of whom has represented the non-profit FightVoterFraud.org.
A hearing regarding WTPUSA’s request for a temporary restraining order is taking place as this article goes to press, with a press conference scheduled directly afterward which can be viewed here.
“Whether your family has religious freedom should not depend on your zip code,” Festa wrote of the entirety of his organization’s efforts. “This is the United States of America, and religious freedom is a right granted to us by God, and guaranteed by our U.S. Constitution. We will not stand idly by while states continue to flagrantly disregard this most precious liberty in the name of a nonexistent ‘public health crisis.’ These states have no evidence that religious exemptions were ever to blame for any epidemic of illness, or that they will ever cause one in the future. We cannot continue to allow religious freedom to be stolen from parents and children on the basis of hypotheticals and fear campaigns. That’s why We The Patriots USA made a commitment to initiate litigation in every state where religious exemptions to vaccinations required for K-12 school attendance have been eliminated, and in any state where they are eliminated in the future.”
As of 10:53 a.m. EDT, the press conference has not yet begun.
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