Alberta separatism is a ploy to increase fossil fuel profits

Alberta Premier Danielle Smith is looking out for oil and gas profiteers as she stokes the fires of Alberta separatism.

In order to protect the planet-destroying oil and gas industry, she is relying on and helping to build up the far-right and its hate. Her government has introduced bill 54 in the Alberta legislature to make it easier for a far-right group to field a referendum on separation.

Polling in early April showed 25% of Albertans supported separation from Canada; after the Liberal’s election win this has risen to 36%.

This is up from 29% during the crest of the “Western Exit” (Wexit) wave, according to a Common Front poll in 2019. Danielle Smith rode this far right wave into the leadership of the United Conservative Party (UCP) to become Alberta premier in 2022, Her campaign was powered by far-right Take Back Alberta (TBA) members operating in the UCP base. Islamophobic, transphobic and left-bashing climate deniers in the TBA lead the Alberta Prosperity Project which is demanding a referendum later this year.

Details from 2019 polling show the political divides in support for separation: 68% of those self-identifying as far right; 46% of UCP supporters (65% in 2025); 11% of Liberal supporters; and 10% of NDP supporters.

Colonial myths and far-right hate

The Alberta Prosperity Project uses the settler colonial myth of “pioneers” with “expectations of self-government" on the “western frontier”, defending their way of life against the political and economic elite in Ontario and Quebec. Their reasons for separation include their belief that the federal government supports, “wokeness, cancel culture, critical race theory, the rewriting of history, and the tearing down of historical monuments;” “the elimination of the supremacy of God;” and has used “a questionable public health crisis to infringe on basic constitutional freedoms.”

The real history of Canada differs from the myths of self-reliant pioneers. It was federal government policies in the 19th century that enabled settlers to take over Indigenous lands in what became the province of Alberta in 1905. The feds built the railroad; set up the Northwest Mounted Police (forerunner of the RCMP); and perpetrated a genocide against Indigenous peoples to take them off the land.

Alberta oil production starting in the late 1940s and transformed the economy almost overnight. Royalties and licenses began providing significant government revenue. After the 1970s oil crisis the federal government wanted greater control of energy policy: Pierre Trudeau’s early 1980s National Energy Policy provoked a precursor wave of “western alienation” pushing Conservative politics to the right.

Smith’s right hand man Rob Anderson co-authored the “Free Alberta Strategy” (FAS) in 2021 to counter alleged “sustained federal attacks” on Alberta’s oil and gas industry. Smith followed this playbook by enacting the Alberta Sovereignty Act as soon as she became Premier.

Fossil fuel projects and pipelines are built over Indigenous land without their consent no matter if it is federal or provincial jurisdiction. Separation tensions amount to a falling out among exploiters and expropriators who are pursing the same settler colonial mission.

And Danielle Smith continues to follow the FAS playbook.

As John Bell explained in 2022: “So the Smith agenda in a nutshell; destruction of public services and the unionized workers who provide them; investing in a local para-military police force; all wrapped up in fairy tales about Alberta’s sovereignty and oil-based economic superiority. And lurking behind it all, poisoning the lives of Albertans the way it poisons everything it touches, is the fossil fuel industry.”

Fossil fuel production in Canada has risen by 150% since 1990 subsidized by both Liberal and Conservative federal governments. But this is not enough for the fossil fuel profiteers. In Alberta, where 84% of Canadian oil is produced, they want to overturn as many restrictions and regulations on their operations as they can to increase profits even more.

FAS demands the elimination of federal environmental assessments, mandated greenhouse gas emissions caps, and BC coastal oil tanker bans. An independent Alberta would become even more favourable for oil producers, or these goals could be achieved by Alberta becoming Trump’s 51st state.

A more likely scenario is the Alberta government is using right wing hate and the separation referendum as a ploy to win increased provincial powers within Canada. There is rarely talk about complications or costs for any of these transitions, and only the fossil fuel profiteers benefit.

Resistance

But the UCP fears struggle from below that could upset their agenda. So they turn to the far-right to try to divide resistance by attacking Indigenous land defenders, immigrants, LGBTQ+ people, people living with disabilities and climate activists.

Smith should be fearful. In 2022 Treaty 8 Grand Chief Arthur Noskey told the press: “We take offence to Danielle Smith's forthcoming sovereignty act and outright reject it.”’

After Bill 54 was tabled, the Confederacy of Treaty 6 First Nations called for Smith to "immediately abandon this dangerous rhetoric and recognize that treaty obligations … are binding commitments that cannot be dismissed or overridden by separatist ambition … and cannot be broken by any province or political party. … our nations do not and will never consent to the separation of our treaty territories. These lands were never ceded, nor surrendered."

Chief Kelsey Jacko of Cold Lake First Nations spoke of the crisis for his people: “Our water is suffering. Our animals are suffering out there. It’s frustrating when everybody thinks about economics, and then we’re left out of it. [Smith] has no right talking the way she is because we are treaty people.”

Many Indigenous leaders, including Chief Sheldon Sunshine of Sturgeon Lake Cree Nation and Chief Billy-Joe Tuccaro of Mikisew Cree First Nation in northeastern Alberta also pushed back. Chief Troy Knowlton of Piikani Nation called the government rhetoric “right out of Trump’s playbook.”

Mi’kmaq senator Paul Prosper demanded that Smith recognize inherent rights “as a pre-condition of the existing rights … that existed before the founding of this country.”

National Chief Cindy Woodhouse Nepinak of the Assembly of First Nations has asked PM Carney for a constitutional review of the 1930’s natural resources provincial transfer agreements that occurred without any First Nations’ consultations.

Last November, trans rights activists protested UCP laws targeting trans children’s rights at school, gender-affirming care and trans women sports bans.

In early February, dozens of people protested against hate on the same corner in St Albert where three white supremacists had held signs saying “deport them all” and “white lives matter” while performing Nazi salutes a few days before.

On May 6, disability advocates, allies and organizations protested at the Alberta legislature against the government’s clawback of Canada Disability Benefit (CDB) payments to those receiving provincial Assisted Income for the Severely Disabled (AISD) money.

Public sector workers are ready to fight back against public service and job cuts too. On May 13 the Alberta Public Employees Union representing 23,000 public service workers announced an historic strike mandate of 90.1% on an 80% turnout. A strike date has not (yet) been set.

Building this resistance and building the connections between these movements is crucial to the fight against Smith and the oil companies, and a larger unified resistance is essential in order to combat the myths of the far-right that Smith's defence of fossil fuels rely on.