The Calgary-Shaw by-election was supposed to be a sleepy race and an easy win for the United Conservative Party but it ended up being a nail-biter with a surprise NDP win.
The Alberta NDP’s Kyle Campbell did what many political watchers believed would never happen by beating UCP candidate Mike Derry to win the by-election in the south Calgary riding that was a UCP stronghold under former cabinet minister Rebecca Schulz.
Campbell is an employee benefits professional and former Somerset residents’ association president who made health care, affordability, and opposition to Alberta’s separation from Canada a key part of his campaign’s message in the by-election.
Provincial cabinet ministers have poured into Calgary-Shaw to support UCP candidate Mike Derry and Danielle Smith has campaigned with him numerous times since the by-election campaign started last month.
Derry is the favourite to win the by-election but the vote is also a test for Smith, who has led a government mired in controversy and a party deeply divided on whether Alberta should separate from Canada.
Smith’s absence from any visible pro-Canada campaigns ahead of her October 19 separation referendum has raised a lot of eyebrows, especially after Prime Minister Mark Carney’s full-throated support of Thomas Lukaszuk’s Forever Canadian campaign in Banff this week.
NDP pitches stability and investment over the UCP’s restructuring and privatization
With only days left before the September 14th by-election in Calgary-Shaw, Alberta NDP leader Naheed Nenshi joined candidate Kyle Campbell to deliver his party’s health care pitch to voters with a pledge of stability and investment in a public system that has undergone massive bureaucratic restructuring and increased privatization since 2023.
Nenshi pledged that within three years of forming government after the 2027 election, the NDP would shorten emergency department wait times, cut surgical, diagnostic, and specialist wait times by 30 per cent, make sure every Albertan has access to a family doctor or nurse practitioner, and, a big one, re-form one single Ministry of Health.
Nenshi said the NDP would also launch a judiciary-led public inquiry into CorruptCare, a wide-ranging government corruption scandal that largely faded into the background over the summer.
Lawyer Irma Roberts is the third candidate to enter the UCP nomination contest in Calgary-South East. Roberts has served as a regional director representing Calgary on the UCP’s provincial board of directors since 2023.
Roberts’ campaign is being run by right-wing political organizer Craig Chandler, who recently ran Mike Derry’s successful campaign for the UCP nomination in Calgary-Shaw. Chandler is also running Erin Averbukh’s UCP nomination campaign in Calgary-Acadia.
Alabi Adenekan and former Freedom Conservative Party chief of staff Stephen Burry are also running for the UCP nomination in this riding.
Karen Peters has been disqualifed from the United Conservative Party nomination contest in Grande Prairie-Wapiti, making first-term MLA Ron Wiebe widely expected to be acclaimed to run for re-election in the 2027 provincial election.
Peters was the UCP constituency president in the northwest Alberta riding and has posted on her personal Facebook page about chemtrails and vaccination conspiracy theories. These posts raised eyebrows among political watchers but neither issue is grounds for disqualification in the current UCP.
Premier Danielle Smith has set Monday, September 14 as the date of the by-election vote in the Calgary-Shaw riding vacated by former UCP MLA Rebecca Schulz earlier this year.
The by-election will see UCP candidate Mike Derry face New Democrat Kyle Campbell, with Progressive Tory candidate Kyle Joseph trying to break into what has been a two-party race in Alberta politics, and Liberal Party leader John Roggeveen trying to get his party back on the radar.
The NDP were quick to put United Conservative Party candidate Mike Derry on the spot on the issue of Alberta separatism, which voters will face in a province-wide referendum on October 19.
An NDP press release sent out the night of Derry’s nomination win questioned his support from Darrell Komick, the president of the UCP constituency association in the neighbouring Calgary-Lougheed who ran in the UCP board president election last year on a pro-independence platform, and campaign manager Craig Chandler, a well-known right-wing political organizer in Calgary.
Chandler recently ran City Councillor Mike Jamieson’s successful election campaign in Ward 12 and is believed to be involved in Erin Averbukh’s campaign for the UCP nomination in the Calgary-Acadia riding (Averbukh’s only competitor in that race at the moment is former Wildrose Independence Party leader Jeevan Mangat).
While polls show that a majority of UCP supporters would vote for Alberta’s separation from Canada, the majority of Alberta voters would vote to remain in Canada. The NDP will undoubtably try to use the by-election to put pressure on the UCP’s internal division on Alberta separatism.
Campbell will face United Conservative Party candidate Mike Derry, who surprised many political watchers last week when he defeated City Councillor Dan McLean in the party’s nomination vote.
With 507 total ballots cast in the UCP membership vote in Calgary-Shaw, Derry earned 286 votes to McLean’s 221 votes. Fifty-three per cent of party members in the riding turned out to vote at the nomination meeting.
Campbell will face UCP’s Mike Derry in race to replace Rebecca Schulz
The Alberta NDP have nominated Kyle Campbell to run as the opposition party’s candidate in the upcoming Calgary-Shaw by-election to choose a new MLA following Rebecca Schulz’s resignation last month.
The by-election in this southwest Calgary riding will be an uphill battle for the NDP but, whenever it’s called in the next five months, it will take place during one of the most unpredictable periods in Alberta politics in recent memory.
There is no shortage of issues of the NDP to focus on in this by-election and it looks like health care and affordability will be top of mind for Campbell as he hits the doors.
It is very easy to overstate the importance of by-elections, but there is little doubt that the results of the by-election in Calgary-Shaw will be interpreted as a measurement of support for Premier Danielle Smith referendum on Alberta’s separation from Canada and her government’s handling of health care and affordability issues.
It will also be an important test for NDP leader Naheed Nenshi, who served as Mayor of Calgary from 2010 to 2021 and won the party’s leadership in 2024 on his ability to increase the party’s support in Calgary.
NDP expected to nominate Kyle Campbell on June 26
Talent management company owner Mike Derry defeated City Councillor Dan McLean to win the United Conservative Party nomination in Calgary-Shaw at a candidate selection vote on June 24.
The nomination vote was held to choose a UCP candidate in the upcoming by-election to replace former UCP MLA Rebecca Schulz, who stepped down on May 15, 2026.
Derry owns the LegenDERRY talent management company and was the talent management lead for Canadian Natural Resources Limited from 2013 to 2022 and is a coach with the Bow Valley Hockey Society. He was the Chief Financial Officer of Calgary-South East UCP association and has volunteered with Conservative MP Tom Kmiec‘s campaign in Calgary Shepard.
UCP members in Calgary-Shaw will choose the candidate to raise their party’s banner in the upcoming by-election to fill the Legislature seat vacated by UCP MLA Rebecca Schulz.
Current city councillor Dan McLean is considered the establishment favourite in this race. The second-term councillor was re-elected last October and has maintained close public ties to the UCP since he ran against Schulz for the nomination in this riding in 2018.
McLean’s decision to jump into provincial politics so soon after the October 2025 municipal election has made him a target of criticism from former councillor Jeff Davison.
McLean faces Mike Derry, an oil and gas industry talent company owner who has the support of well-known right-wing political organizer Craig Chandler.
Another candidate, Stewart Jeanes, had planned to run but did not qualify to enter the nomination race. Jeanes had been endorsed by separatist leader and Bonnyville-Cold Lake-St. Paul UCP constituency president Mitch Sylvestre.
The nomination vote is being held from 3:00 pm to 8:30 pm at the Cardel Rec South.
Somerset Residents Association President Kyle Campbell is the first candidate to enter the Alberta NDP nomination in Calgary-Shaw ahead of the expected by-election. The NDP have scheduled a nomination meeting on Friday, June 26 at 7:00 pm at the Cardel Rec South.
According to his LinkedIn profile, Campbell is the Director of Employee Benefits for Qopia Financial and previously worked as Senior Sales Consultant for RBC Insurance. He studied Global Supply Chain Management at Brigham Young University.
“I’m running to protect the essential services our province delivers. My life is deeply impacted by the province of Alberta: career opportunities, public education for my children, cancer care for myself, and more,” Campbell told Daveberta.
“I’m running to ensure that as my kids grow up that they are afforded the same quality of life, and quality of protection that I’ve benefited from,” Campbell said. “I’m keen to protect their rights as Albertans, and their privileges as Canadians.”
A by-election in Calgary-Shaw is imminent following the resignation of United Conservative Party MLA Rebecca Schulz, who stepped down last month after representing the riding since 2019. Schulz served as Minister of Environment and Protected Areas until her resignation from cabinet last December.
The UCP nomination contest is now set for June 24 but the race got one candidate smaller this week after Stewart Jeanes was told by the UCP that he will not be allowed to run after his application was deemed incomplete.
Jeanes’ candidacy in the Calgary-Shaw nomination contest was recently endorsed by Mitch Sylvestre, the Alberta separatist leader and UCP constituency president from Bonnyville-Cold Lake-St. Paul who led the Stay Free Alberta petition drive to leave Canada.
Danielle Smith’s Alberta separation referendum looms over party nominations for next election
MLA Kyle Kasawski was nominated to run for re-election in Sherwood Park by Alberta NDP members at a meeting last weekend in the large suburban hamlet east of Edmonton.
Kasawski currently serves as the opposition’s Affordability and Utilities critic role has been one of the strongest additions to the NDP opposition bench since 2023.
Kasawski has been vocal in his opposition to Alberta separatism and called on Premier Danielle Smith to speak out against foreign interference.
