Tag: Mitch Sylvestre

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Daveberta Podcast

Podcast: Why Canada needs Alberta and Alberta needs Canada

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Part 1 in a Daveberta Podcast series about Alberta, Canada, and the stories we do and don’t tell each other

Longtime Daveberta Podcast contributor Adam Rozenhart joins Dave Cournoyer for a discussion about Canada’s role in Alberta and Alberta’s role in Canada as neighbours and leaders in our country.

This is part 1 of a podcast series about where Albertans fit in the sprawling success story we call Canada and how we can tell better stories about why Albertans are important players in making our country a better place.

Part 2 will be released in about a week.

Thanks for listening.

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Alberta Politics

Kyle Campbell running for NDP nomination in Calgary-Shaw by-election

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.”

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Alberta Politics

Rebecca Schulz resigns, UCP and NDP set nomination dates for Calgary-Shaw by-election

Rebecca Schulz speaking at the United Conservative Party Leaders Dinner in Calgary in 2025 (source: Rebecca Schulz / Facebook)
Rebecca Schulz speaking at the United Conservative Party Leaders Dinner in Calgary in 2025 (source: Rebecca Schulz / Facebook)

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.

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Alberta Politics

Danielle Smith dug the separatist hole she’s now stuck in

UCP leader Danielle Smith on election night in Calgary (source: Danielle Smith / Facebook)
UCP leader Danielle Smith on election night in Calgary (source: Danielle Smith / Facebook)

Former conservative premiers Ralph Klein and Peter Lougheed told Alberta separatists to pound dirt

An Angus Reid survey released this week found that 56 per cent of Albertans believe Smith is handling the separatism issue poorly and 58 per cent believe she is calling the referendum to appease the separatists in her party. Sixty-nine per cent of Albertans surveyed believe the separatists will never accept a no vote result in the referendum.

Smith dug the political hole she now finds herself in. After years of bending over backward for the separatists in her party by amending laws, fuelling the flames of resentment, and appealing for them to the courts, she has found herself in a politically untenable situation. Simply claiming to be pro-Canada at the eleventh hour is hilariously unconvincing.

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Alberta Politics

Yes, Alberta is actually having a separation referendum

Alberta Premier Danielle Smith, US President-elect Donald Trump, and celebrity investor Kevin O’Leary (source: Danielle Smith / Facebook)
Alberta Premier Danielle Smith, US President Donald Trump, and celebrity investor Kevin O’Leary (source: Danielle Smith / Facebook)

There’s a lot happening following Premier Smith’s announcement last week that she has decided to hold a province-wide referendum on October 19, 2026 about Alberta’s separation from Canada. Here are some of the latest updates:

  • “The party won’t be taking a position and I won’t be making mine public,” UCP President Rob Smith told CBC Radio this week when asked if he or the governing party would pick a side in the Alberta separation referendum. Most polls show a majority of UCP voters support Alberta separating from Canada.
  • Environics and Angus Reid have released fresh polling about Albertans response to Smith’s separation referendum.
    • The Angus Reid survey found that 56 per cent of Albertans believe Smith is handling the issue poorly and 58 per cent believe she is calling the referendum to appease the separatists in her party.
    • Sixty-nine per cent of Albertans surveyed believe the separatists will never accept a no vote result in the referendum.

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Alberta Politics

Separatists are entrenched in Danielle Smith’s UCP and aren’t going away

The Alberta Prosperity Project’s Jeffrey Rath shows off the separatist group’s proposed referendum question in Calgary (source: Facebook).
The Alberta Prosperity Project’s Jeffrey Rath shows off the separatist group’s proposed referendum question in Calgary (source: Facebook).

Former conservative party premiers Peter Lougheed and Ralph Klein would have told the separatists to pound dirt and wouldn’t have allowed them to dig themselves into their party like they have in the UCP.

The referendum will almost certainly further deepen the divide in conservative politics in this province along pro-Canada and pro-separation lines.

In her press conference today, Smith called for the losing side of this referendum to “accept the judgement of people and the direction that we go.”

That seems unlikely.

This referendum is guaranteed to string out this debate.

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Alberta Politics

No one is happy with Danielle Smith’s separation referendum question

Alberta Premier Danielle Smith speaks at the United Conservative Party’s Leader’s Dinner in Edmonton in March 2025 (source: Danielle Smith / Facebook)
Alberta Premier Danielle Smith speaks at the United Conservative Party’s Leader’s Dinner in Edmonton in March 2025 (source: Danielle Smith / Facebook)

The wording of the referendum question will make no one happy.

Many, if not most, of the more than 456,000 Albertans who signed Thomas Lukaszuk’s pro-Canada Forever Canadian petition did so with the belief it would block an actual separation referendum from ever happening. Lukaszuk said he’d rather have MLAs vote on the question in the Legislature to save Albertans from having a costly and divisive referendum.

The leaders of Alberta’s separatist Stay Free Alberta petition are spitting mad and calling for Smith to be toppled by UCP members for not holding a yes or no question. Some separatist organizers are trying to convince 22 UCP constituency association presidents to sign a letter to trigger a Special General Meeting to remove Smith as party leader before October.

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Alberta Politics

Danielle Smith shows her love for Canada by holding a separation referendum

Premier Danielle Smith and separatist leader Mitch Sylvestre at a UCP fundraising dinner in Bonnyville in May 2025 (source: Bonnyville-Cold Lake-St. Paul UCP / Facebook)
Premier Danielle Smith and separatist leader Mitch Sylvestre at a UCP fundraising dinner in Bonnyville in May 2025 (source: Bonnyville-Cold Lake-St. Paul UCP / Facebook)

Does it make any sense? No. But not much does in Alberta politics these days.

“Should Alberta remain a province of Canada, or should the Government of Alberta commence the legal process required under the Canadian Constitution to hold a binding provincial referendum on whether or not Alberta should separate from Canada?”

That’s the referendum question that Premier Danielle Smith has decided to put on the 10th paper ballot that Albertans will be handed when they show up to vote on October 19, 2026.

Smith says the wordy multiple choice question was her only option because the court ruling quashing Elections Alberta’s approval of the separatist Stay Free Alberta citizen initiative petition ruled out a question where yes and no were the only answers.

Smith had an option to not hold the referendum at all but she opened this can of worms and it won’t easily be closed. The populist-turned-separatist-wing of the United Conservative Party that booted former premier Jason Kenney and then boosted Smith into the Premier’s Office is now firmly entrenched in the governing party — and they are not going away.

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Alberta Politics

What a gong show! MLA committee chaos crashes UCP separation referendum motion

Leduc-Beaumont UCP MLA and and Special Citizen Initiative Proposal Review Committee chair Brandon Lunty (screenshot from assembly.ab.ca)
Leduc-Beaumont UCP MLA and and Special Citizen Initiative Proposal Review Committee chair Brandon Lunty (screenshot from assembly.ab.ca)

Trigger-happy UCP misfires with Mission Accomplished press release

Brandon Lunty looked like he wanted to crawl out of his own skin when he found out that the United Conservative Party Caucus sent out a press release announcing the adoption of a motion that hadn’t even been voted on yet.

As chair of the Special Citizen Initiative Proposal Review Committee, Leduc-Beaumont UCP MLA Lunty had one job today: to steer a motion through the committee to recommend the adoption of a referendum question on Alberta separation from Canada.

It should have been easy. The UCP has a 3-2 majority on the committee over the opposition NDP and Lunty controlled all the levers. The last minute scheduled hour and a half meeting that was only called on Monday should have given the UCP plenty of time to finish the task if only some poor staffer at the UCP Caucus hadn’t clicked send too early on the press release declaring it was a done deal.

Read all about it on the Daveberta Substack

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Alberta Politics

Elected officials should be coming out and voicing our commitment to Canada and to Confederation, says Michael Janz

Thomas Lukaszuk speaks with reporters about the Forever Canadian Avenue proposal with supporters and the Alberta Legislature Building in the background (source: Dave Cournoyer)
Thomas Lukaszuk speaks with reporters about the Forever Canadian Avenue proposal with supporters and the Alberta Legislature Building in the background (source: Dave Cournoyer)

Michael Janz’s Forever Canadian Avenue announcement comes just days after a judge quashed Elections Alberta’s approval of a citizen initiative petition organized by separatist leaders with deep ties to the governing United Conservative Party.

Premier Danielle Smith called the judge’s ruling antidemocratic and declared her government would appeal the decision as separatist leaders publicly threatened her leadership of the party if she didn’t intervene. While a large majority of Albertans support remaining in Canada, a majority of UCP voters tell pollsters they would vote for Alberta to separate from Canada if a referendum is held.

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Alberta Politics

Won’t a new pipeline make the Alberta separatists happy?

Smith used the threat of national unity crisis to leverage the approval of a new pipeline to the Pacific Coast, and it looks like she just might get that. So this is a political win for Smith — especially because the September 1, 2027 target for the start of construction of a new pipeline lines up with the start of the next provincial general election campaign.

Expect “We got Alberta a pipeline!” to be splashed all over UCP re-election ads in 2027.

But don’t expect the promise of an oil pipeline to dampen the enthusiasm of Alberta’s separation activists. That was demonstrated clearly last November when Smith was booed by delegates at the UCP AGM when she touted the signing of the Memorandum of Understanding about pipelines and electrification.

For them, it was never about building a pipeline.

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Alberta Politics

Danielle Smith will take the pipeline but won’t shelve the separatism talk

Premier Danielle Smith and Prime Minister Mark Carney speak at a joint press conference in Calgary on Friday, May 15, 2026.
Premier Danielle Smith and Prime Minister Mark Carney speak at a joint press conference in Calgary on Friday, May 15, 2026.

Will she just call a referendum anyway? Yes, probably.

Expect “We got Alberta a pipeline!” to be splashed all over UCP re-election ads in 2027.

But don’t expect the promise of an oil pipeline to dampen the enthusiasm of Alberta’s separation activists. That was demonstrated clearly last November when Smith was booed by delegates at the UCP AGM when she touted the signing of the Memorandum of Understanding about pipelines and electrification.

For them, it was never about building a pipeline.

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Alberta Politics

Alberta separation policy resolution submitted for UCP AGM in November 2026

There is already a motion being proposed to adopt separatism as an official party policy at the UCP’s fall AGM.

A divisive policy debate about separatism was narrowly avoided by a vote by the UCP’s provincial board before separatist-endorsed candidates swept the majority of the party’s board positions at year’s AGM in Edmonton.

Emmott Kelsey of the Centurion Project is a UCP member and has submitted a policy resolution for debate at the UCP AGM that would officially endorse Alberta leaving Canada.

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Alberta Politics

Separatist leader threatens nomination challenges against UCP MLAs

Separatist spokesperson Jeffrey Rath appeared to threaten to launch nomination challenges against any UCP MLAs who opposed Alberta separatism.

It is probably not surprising that one UCP MLA is already planning to resign and a growing number of UCP cabinet ministers are rumoured to be considering not seeking re-election in 2027 (which is also leading to rumours of a spring cabinet shuffle).

The key takeaway from this is that the separatism debate won’t end with a referendum.

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Alberta Politics

Danielle Smith makes her Alberta separatist problem our provincial problem

Alberta Premier Danielle Smith speaks to the Canada Strong and Free Conference in Ottawa on May 8, 2026 (source: Canada Strong and Free Network / Facebook)
Alberta Premier Danielle Smith speaks to the Canada Strong and Free Conference in Ottawa on May 8, 2026 (source: Canada Strong and Free Network / Facebook)

Jen Gerson penned an excellent op-ed in the Globe & Mail arguing that the biggest privacy breach of personal information in Alberta’s history presents Smith with a perfect opportunity to sever her party’s separatist wing (92 per cent of Alberta separatists are UCP supporters). Gerson is right that it is an opening for Smith but it might be politically impossible without tearing the UCP apart — something Smith won’t want to do.

Gerson argued forcefully on Ryan Jespersen’s Real Talk that Smith is making her political problem our provincial problem.

Many of the UCP’s most enthusiastic political activists, the ones who show up to constituency meetings and policy conventions, have also spent the past three months collecting signatures for the Stay Free Alberta citizen initiative to force a referendum on Alberta’s independence from Canada.

Many of those same activists cut their political teeth organizing opposition to COVID-19 public health measures and vaccinations, and embrace and promote the deep well of online conspiracy theories associated with that movement.

Read all about it on the Daveberta Substack

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