Jonathan Bush is running for Maine governor, but it’s unclear if he meets a key requirement for the job.

Bush, the cousin of former President George W. Bush, has strong family ties to Maine and has portrayed himself as a “disruptor” from outside state government who can bring about positive change in his bid to win the Republican primary and succeed Gov. Janet Mills.

But the law says the governor has to have lived in Maine at least five years before taking office. Bush might not clear that bar.

Although he bought a home in Cape Elizabeth in late 2020, he continued to maintain ties to Massachusetts. Tax records show that between 2020 and 2023, he received residential property tax exemptions in Cambridge. He didn’t register to vote in Cape Elizabeth until October 2022 — three years and five months ago.

Bush’s campaign would not provide the dates he has lived in Maine, and issued a written statement in response to questions about whether he meets the residency requirement.

“Jonathan Bush has deep roots in Maine and a proven record of bringing over 900 jobs here; he is clearly qualified to be Maine’s governor in every way,” the statement said.

The Maine Constitution states that the governor must “have been 5 years a resident of the state” at the time he or she takes office but does not elaborate on how residency should be defined. A Maine high court ruling in 1994 established that the five years does not need to be consecutive to the commencement of the governor’s term.

Bush is not the only candidate facing questions about whether he meets the requirement. Nirav Shah, a Democrat, first moved to Maine in 2019, then left for Atlanta from 2023 to 2025 when he got a job at the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. Shah voted in Georgia in 2024, the Bangor Daily News reported this month.

Shah’s campaign says he meets the requirement because he lived in Maine from June 2019 to March 2023 and returned in February 2025, meaning that he would exceed the five year requirement by the time he would take office in January 2027.

The secretary of state’s office had a March 23 deadline to challenge the eligibility of primary petitions. No challenges were filed for any candidates in the governor’s race.

Jana Spaulding, a spokesperson for the secretary of state’s office, said Friday that they were not aware of any statutes that would allow for a candidate’s qualifications for the ballot to be challenged after the primary petition deadline.

HOW IS RESIDENCY DEFINED?

Asked for guidance on what constitutes residency, Spaulding provided the language in the constitution and a copy of the high court decision. The court made its ruling when now-U.S. Sen. Susan Collins was running for governor after having served in state and federal government in Massachusetts from 1992 to 1993.

That decision, however, was focused on whether the five years had to be consecutive with the start of the governor’s term and did not get into other residency questions.

Marshall Tinkle, a Portland attorney who has written on and researched the Maine Constitution, said in an email that “resident” is not defined and the high court has also not defined it for the purposes of the requirements to be governor.

“When resident has been used elsewhere, the Law Court has said it’s ambiguous,” Tinkle said. “In this context, it almost certainly means living in a home here for an extended period of time though it would still be possible to have another residence outside the state.”

The secretary of state’s office also pointed to guidance about how Maine determines eligibility to vote. That guidance says that for voting purposes, a person can establish residency in a variety of ways, including with a utility bill, driver’s license or motor vehicle registration.

Secretary of State Shenna Bellows is running in the Democratic primary for governor, and her office did not respond to questions seeking further clarity on how the constitutional requirement could be met.

The department’s guidance notes that “residency is defined differently for different legal purposes.”

For income tax purposes, for example, a person is considered a Maine resident if they are “domiciled” in the state or maintain a permanent residence and spend more than 183 days of the year in the state, according to Maine Revenue Services.

Guidance from the state says there’s no one way to determine where a person is domiciled, but some factors that can be used to make such a determination include where they spend the most time; whether they’ve applied for a homestead or veterans tax exemption or comparable benefit; where they register to vote and where they’ve earned their wages.

BUSH’S HISTORY IN MAINE & MASSACHUSETTS

Bush purchased his home in Cape Elizabeth in December 2020 — buying the 15,455-square-foot structure for $7.55 million from former two-time gubernatorial candidate Eliot Cutler. Town records show the house underwent a renovation and a certificate of occupancy was issued in July 2022 — less than four years ago.

Bush then registered to vote in Cape Elizabeth in October 2022. He indicated on his voter registration card that it was a new Maine voter registration, and that he had previously been registered in Cambridge, Massachusetts.

Tax records show that between 2020 and 2023, Bush received exemptions on properties in Cambridge that are only available to people who live in properties as their primary residences.

In Maine, Bush first took a homestead exemption on the Cape Elizabeth property in the 2024-2025 tax year, and he also received one in 2025-2026, according to town tax records.

Maine’s homestead exemption provides a reduction of up to $25,000 in the value of a home for property tax purposes. It is only available to permanent residents who have owned their homes for at least 12 months prior to applying.

ARE TIES TO MAINE ENOUGH?

Bush’s ties to Maine are deep. His family has long maintained a compound at Walker’s Point in Kennebunkport, where last summer the town threw a posthumous 100th birthday party for matriarch Barbara Bush, complete with lobster rolls and Tex-Mex cuisine in a nod to the family’s connections to both Maine and Texas.

Bush is the cousin of President George W. Bush, nephew of President George H. W. Bush, and brother of television presenter Billy Bush.

In 2008, Bush moved the operations center for athenahealth, the healthcare technology company he founded in 1997, to Belfast, Maine, and has talked frequently about how the center created about 1,000 jobs in the area. Bush resigned as CEO of the company in 2018.

A 2016 write-up on Bush in Maine magazine noted that Bush vacationed in Kennebunkport growing up, and that his family at the time was spending “part of its summers” in North Haven.

Bush is among eight Republicans to qualify for the primary in the governor’s race, and he was leading the field in fundraising as of the most recently available campaign finance reports from January. Bush had raised $1.3 million, while Bobby Charles was second with just over $600,000.