Alberta Premier Danielle Smith has finally called a by-election in Edmonton Strathcona, four months after NDP Leader Naheed Nenshi was acclaimed as the Opposition party’s candidate in the riding long held former premier Rachel Notley.
The premier also called by-elections to fill two other seats, Edmonton-Ellerslie, where former MLA Rod Loyola resigned to run for the federal Liberals before being skidded for remarks he made years ago at a rally, and Olds-Didsbury-Three Hills, to replace former Speaker Nathan Cooper who is about to resign to become Alberta’s trade representative in Washington.
While the UCP will try hard in Edmonton-Ellerslie to score a seat in NDP-dominated Edmonton, Olds-Didsbury-Three Hills may be the riding with the most potential for an interesting outcome if the separatist lunatics encouraged by Premier Smith to own the Libs in Ottawa split the vote enough to embarrass the government.
With the caveat that nothing in politics is impossible, a split big enough to elect a New Democrat in Olds-Didsbury-Three Hills is about as unlikely as a Conservative victory in Edmonton-Strathcona, one of the safest NDP ridings in the province.
The by-elections will be held on June 23, pretty much in the middle of the dog days of summer. Advance voting will take place from June 17 to June 21.
Well those by elections were starting to pile up. Further delay could begin to look embarrassing and attract unwanted questions and attention. Also, the UCP might be concerned about that separatist candidate in one of them. So better to act now than give him more time to build support. After all the only separatist ever elected in Alberta was in the early 80’s in a by election.
By elections still remain a low risk way for disgruntled voters to send a message to a government. While most of rural Alberta remains right leaning that does not mean they are entirely happy with the UCP for a number of reasons.
As Smith has already fairly clearly said, one of her greatest concerns in there will be a separatist party in Alberta and it will not be the UCP. So best to try nip this in the bud as soon as possible.
As noted in my previous post;
Marlaina was in Olds supposedly backing her choice for the UCP party -Tara Sawyer.
DS posted ” standing room only”
In her photo-op. However, the Albertan and the St Albert Gazette showed pictures from the school gym of the 200+(?) people, the vast majority of whom were sitting, and there seemed to be plenty of empty floor space, like BIGLY !!
They were, standing up for pictures holding signs
>> I stand with Danielle <<
??? Befuddled by the messaging
there.
As far as the 'ARP' candidate, he's trying to go after the Indigenous vote because he says they will be better off if Alberta separated— the level of tone-deafness on his part is unbelievable. It's almost as bad as the # Stornoway Squatter's campaign promise of making the Indigenous people the richest people in the world.
Wait, do I detect a prairie rattler ??
Well their hero is Trumpty Dumpty Randi, and he can’t take “no” for an answer, either.
Naheed Nenshi is basically going to shame Danielle Smith, because of her deceitful ways. She is very afraid of that reality.
I work with a guy who lives in Didsbury. It’s a true blue haven with zero chance of going NDP. The UCP candidate there has about as much of a chance of losing as PeePee does in the safest CPC riding in all of Canada.