The Decibel - Alberta separatist campaign faces legal hurdles

Episode Date: May 6, 2026

This week marked an important milestone in the separatist campaign in Alberta. After months of getting people to sign their petitions to trigger a referendum on independence, the separatist leaders submitted their signatures to Elections Alberta for verification. But Elections Alberta cannot count the signatures right now. That’s because of a court injunction that was put in place last month while a judge considers whether the treaty rights of some First Nations have been violated. It’s one of many legal challenges the separatist movement in Alberta is facing. Matthew Scace is a Globe reporter based in Alberta. He’ll explain the two major cases against the separatists, and what the leaders say they’ll do if the courts don’t rule in their favour. Questions? Comments? Ideas? Email us at [e-mail] Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

Listen, folks, we stand in the press and this is one of the greatest moments in the history of Alberta. We're about to hand in the signatures for this province to become a free republic. Monday marked an important milestone in the separatist campaign in Alberta. After months of getting people to sign their petitions, the separatist leaders submitted their signatures to elections Alberta for verification. And I just want to extend my heartfelt thanks to all of my fellow Albertans who took the time to engage. to send a strong message to Ottawa that Alberta is leaving Canada. How am I feeling?

Happy and relieved. It was a lot of work. And it was full-time work for four months. And we're happy to be done. We're happy with the number. We're happy with everything. Just good. That was separatist leaders Jeffrey Rath and Mitch Sylvester.

They say that the campaign has submitted over 300,000 signatures. There's a referendum. already scheduled for this fall, and that many signatures is more than enough to add a question about Alberta independence. There's only one problem. All of this may not matter. There's a legal challenge questioning the validity of the separatist's petition, and it isn't the only court battle the separatists are facing. Matthew Skase is a Globe reporter based in Alberta covering the separatist movement. He's on the show to lay out the two major cases against the separatists

and what the leaders say they'll do if the courts don't rule in their favor. I'm Cheryl Sutherland, and this is the decibel from the Globe and Mail. Hi, Matt, thanks so much for coming back on the show. Glad to be back, Cheryl. So you were in Edmonton when the separatist leaders handed over their petition signatures.

Can you paint the scene of what happened? Yeah, it was quite a scene in Northwest Edmonton. there were a lot of people and a lot of Alberta flags when Mitch Sylvester rolled into the front of Elections, Alberta's main offices. He was kind of greeted like a hero. It's been four months where this group has been collecting signatures around the province trying to force this question. And this was sort of the moment of truth because they've been very quiet about how many signatures they actually have. About a month ago, they said they had reached their mark. but we didn't know how close they were to the mark.

So when he finally announced that there were about 301,000 signatures in the boxes in the trailer that he drove from his hometown of Bonneville, Alberta, that was the first indication of what kind of movement we were dealing with for the past four months. It was a total party for separatists. Definitely an historic moment for Alberta because it is putting us closer, at least one step closer to having a referendum on sovereignty. Yeah, okay, so they say 301,000 signatures, and the threshold was 178,000.

So that's quite a bit higher than what they were meant to get. Is it surprising that they were able to garner this many names? Whether this was surprising, it's been a really prominent movement here over the past four months. At the very beginning, we saw really long lines of people to sign up. That said there were few canvassers who were able to do the job. And it is quite a process to sign. You don't just provide a signature and walk away.

You have to give your personal information to verify that you actually did sign it. But they've been hosting rallies across the province in small towns. They've been going everywhere. We actually had you on the show to talk about the movement, right? You had attended rallies. You talked to some of the leaders. So you've been involved in all of this, seeing what the momentum has been like. Yeah.

And small towns like Eckville, which has population about 1,000, brought out more than 400 people, went to small gatherings of 20 to 30 people in towns of 100. So they've been everywhere and they've been very visible. And a lot of them are very passionate and they've taken a lot of time out of their lives to advocate for this. So I wouldn't say I am surprised, but there were doubts. It was a petition drive that happened in the middle of winter. It's dark. It's cold. It's really hard to get people out. And there were questions about whether they would hit a plateau because there is a hardcore group that really do support this. But the question was, are there other people who are interested in the idea? And I don't know what

this indicates on that front, but it does indicate that there is support for this. And it's, if everything goes their way in terms of the courts, which we'll talk about, this is going to go a referendum. And they did what they needed to do under the Alberta law. The one final thing I will note is that there was a pro-Canadian petition that happened last summer. that was sort of the counter effort to this petition drive. And they gathered more than 400,000, which is about 100,000 more than the separatists did. Okay. So we're at this point now where the petitions have been delivered to Elections, Alberta for the separatist side.

So Elections Alberta, just to say, is an independent, nonpartisan office that oversees elections and referendums in the province. So they are essentially the authority that certifies results. What happens next, Matt? So normally elections Alberta would begin counting these signatures. They have their own process where they basically take a sample and then make an estimate about what the actual number is. But right now they're not allowed to do anything with those boxes that Mitch delivered on Monday. That's because there is a court decision that we are waiting for that could arrive today, it could arrive tomorrow, could arrive in a couple weeks, that is surrounding challenged by a group of Alberta First Nations. And after the hearings on that case, happened about a month ago, the judge overseeing that case decided to put a temporary injunction or pause on the counting until she reaches a final decision on that case. So right now those boxes are being protected by elections Alberta 24 hours a day. They have been locked up and won't be counted until we get that decision. So we're still in a bit of a holding pattern where we won't know

what that final number is until we get this decision. We have no idea when that's going to happen. Okay, so no counting is happening because of this injunction. Let's break down this case. How did it come about? Yeah, so this case came about in early January when a First Nation called Sturgeon Lake Crea Nation filed a lawsuit against the chief electoral officer, the provincial government, and the federal government arguing that a separation referendum in Alberta would violate their constitutionally protected treaty rights. and they lay out a list of arguments as to why that would be the case. They raised the specter of foreign interference. They raise concerns about their treaty rights if Alberta did vote to separate. And that's what kick-started this process. And then a couple other First Nations got on board and filed their own challenges.

And it was all lumped together in this hearing that happened in early April. And they're effectively asking the judge to reinsert a very tricky clause into the law that governs this whole process that the United Conservative Party took out last December that says a question that goes to a referendum under the citizen initiative action. It should be constitutional. Right now, the way the law works

is that a question put forward by groups like the separatists doesn't have to be constitutional. And so they're asking for the law to require that that question is constitutional. And the other First Nations are asking that they judge end the petition approval altogether. Both things would basically block the petition from being counted. I want to come back to the point you made about the constitutionality of the question.

Why is that important to these First Nations? It's important because, well, their treaties are enshrined in the Canadian Constitution and treaties are governed by the Crown. Their argument is that if Alberta separates, what happens? Truly what happens to its relationship to the Crown, to Ottawa, and what does that mean for treaty rights? Their argument is that that that relationship will be completely broken and that they don't really know what would happen. And so that's the gist of what they've been arguing.

You mentioned foreign interference before. Can you explain that part of their argument, the First Nations argument around foreign interference? The group that has been leading the charge up until about January is called the Alberta Prosperity Project. And in the Surgeon Lakes affidavit, they raised a lot of concerns about that group, partly because their leaders, Mr. Sylvester and Jeffrey Rath, a lawyer, met with members of the U.S. State Department.

We don't know who the Prosperity Project has not disclosed its donor list. And so there have been questions about whether the U.S. may try to influence the result of the independence vote. The Trump administration has expressed interest in the idea of Alberta independence to. And so that's part of their argument as well, is that we are entering a space if we do end up having a referendum where we will be very vulnerable to foreign interference and reporting we've done here at the globe too. There have been a lot of experts that have talked to us who have said elections Alberta has limited capacity to combat foreign interference. It can deal with the hyperdomestic in Alberta. But once you sort of go across borders, it becomes really, really hard to control that.

And so that's part of the First Nations argument, too, is that we're just heading into a space that could be. be really, really challenging to manage. Okay, so just so I understand, the First Nations involved in the case are asking the judge to essentially prevent an independence vote from ever happening in Alberta. Correct. They are arguing that we are sort of in this stage where we have to act now. Because once we get to a vote and if Alberta does choose to separate, we're at a point of no return, basically.

And that's what their lawyers argued. What have the leaders of the separatist campaign said about this legal challenge? So Jeff Rath, he's one of the main figureheads and leaders of the movement. He's also a lawyer, so he appeared in court. And his argument was mainly two things. One is that because this isn't the petition process, and it's so early, effectively the separatists are just gaining signatures to see whether they have support for an idea. It doesn't infringe on treaty rights because nothing's actually happened yet. it has not separated and it's nowhere close to doing that.

So that was one of his first arguments and also argued that it's not the judge's job to decide the law. That's the provincial government's job. So when the government decided to remove the provision that required a citizen initiative question to be constitutional, that was the government's decision and that's the law now and that should be the law that the judge works with. And he also has tried to reassure First Nations, I don't think successfully, that their treaty rights would be upheld and that they would actually be better off if Alberta does separate.

We should also note that the government of Alberta is also a participant in this case. What have they said? The government has a somewhat similar argument to Mr. Rath. They described the stage that we're in right now as the opening moments of a five act to play, where if you're collecting signatures, it's so early that it's hard to say, again, whether it would infringe treaty rights. they also say that they believe that there are off-ramps available. So it's a debate really about whether it's too early to suspend the entire process.

Okay. So the judge in this case, Justice Shana Leonard, she might make her decision in a matter of days or weeks. If she sides with the First Nations, what will that mean for the separatist movement? It's hard to say what it will actually mean long term. There are sort of two parts to this. One, it would likely totally suspend whatever efforts they've made so far and block them from the elections of Alberta from counting the signatures, and it would probably block them from getting on the referendum ballot in the fall.

That said, this case is dealing with the Citizen Initiative Act, and it does not mean that the Alberta government could not call their own question on Alberta independence if they wanted to. So that means that Premier Daniel Smith, if she wishes, could call a question. herself and that we would still have the vote. That's so interesting. So the government itself could actually call a referendum. Do we have a sense of this likelihood of this happening? Or is it just too soon to say?

It's too soon to say. But Mr. Sylvester is a UCP, a United Conservative Party constituency president in Bonneville. He has some sort of relationship with the Premier, not exactly clear. And he's told me several times that if elections Alberta is not allowed, to count the signatures, that he will then deliver those signatures to the government. And on Monday, he actually read out a letter to the Premier asking her to respect the will of Albertans through this process. Dear Premier Smith, on behalf of the State Free Alberta campaign, I'm pleased to advise you

today that we delivered to Elections Alberta 301,4606th. independent petition initiated under the Citizens Initiative Act well surpassing the required threshold set by elections Alberta this process shows that albertans are engaged and this is an issue people want to have a say on from all perspectives he was quite explicit that if elections albert is not allowed to call the referendum then she will be the one who has to do that whether she does it we do not know she has not said we'll have to have to see what happens in this uh First Nations challenge. If this all does get struck and I think we're going to enter a very interesting space if that is what happens. We'll be right back. So Matt, this case that we've

been talking about up to now involves First Nations and their treaty rights. But this is actually just one of many legal challenges facing the separatist movement. So we're going to talk about one other one in particular. And it involves a separatist leader named David Parker. Can you tell me about him? So David Parker is a longtime organizer. In Alberta, he's operated on the right flank of the conservative movement. And recently he has become sympathetic with the separatist movement. He originally started this group called Take Back Alberta several years ago. And he has been working on the separatist file for several months now.

And a couple months ago, he announced that he was starting this group called the Centurian Project. What exactly is the Centurian project? The one thing I guess to know about the separatist movement in Alberta is that it's very decentralized. And so the main group behind the petition is Mr. Sylvester's group called Stay Free Alberta. Sort of in the background, we saw this group called the Centurion Project that Mr. Parker was starting to boot up. And it seemed to have very similar goals to Stay Free Alberta, but it was separate and doing its own thing. So about a month ago, he started talking about this tool that he was using that was going to help get at the vote in the lead up to the October referendum on separation. And what exactly was this tool?

Yeah, so this tool effectively was a database of names, and it would allow organizers in the separatist movement to identify other separatist sympathizers and understand where the support in Alberta lied for separatism so they could track who's supporting, provide insight in how to deploy volunteers, how to deploy money, and really provide this granular detail about how much. support there is very much a get out the vote tool. And I had this massive database full of names where you could search up anyone's name. Rachel Nott, you look up anyone, anyone, really. Can you help me understand why is it a problem that the Centurion Project has this information?

So this database was populated with almost 3 million people. And when you looked it up, it would be this really clean presentation where you would have basically names and addresses. What really set off red flags was the fact there were almost three million names in there, which is close to the number of electors in Alberta. What my colleagues, Carrie Tate and Chen Wong, were able to do was scrape that database. And what they found was there was much more data inside that database than was initially presented. It included phone numbers, home addresses, voter identification numbers, which indicated that this was more than just a phone book,

effectively. It was allegedly a actual voter list that would normally be provided to a political party, which the political party is not allowed to share by law. And so that really set off red flags on Wednesday night of last week. Elections Alberta officials showed up and handed Mr. Parker in his group a cease and desist letter. And the next morning they filed for an injunction asking the project to take down the website. Okay. So you said not allowed to share, which I think would translate into not publicly available. Is that correct? Correct. Yeah. Yeah. So just to encapsulate the problem here, having the database certainly helped separatist campaigners organize, but the bigger problem is that it's a breach of privacy and there are rules around who can access

the elections Alberta electors list. Is that right? That's right. Yeah. And the reason this is a problem is because you cannot opt out of being on the voter list. And so anyone who's on that list, You could be someone who is fleeing domestic violence. You could be law enforcement. You could be a judge. You could be a journalist. There are people who can remove themselves from phone books. You can't remove yourself from this list.

So this made almost every outvoting, Albertan, readily identifiable on the internet by making an account that took less than a minute to make. And so that's really the privacy issue here for everyday Albertans is that people who don't want their private data to be disclosed was out in the open. So if the Centurion Project is not supposed to have this list, how did they allegedly get it? So what Elections Alberta's lawyers said in court last week was they looked at the database. And what they do when they give a party a list of voters, they seat it with a number of fake names. It's called salting. And so if a voter list is leaked into the public or it gets into the wrong hands, they can look at that list and then search up those fake names and effectively trace it back to whoever they get.

it to. And what elections Alberta alleges is that that voter list came from a pro-separatist party called the Republican Party of Alberta. So the realities of the Republican Party is allowed to have this list because it is a registered party, but they are not allowed to share it. And that's sort of where the problem starts here. Okay. So basically through the names that they salt the list with, they were able to trace it back to the Republican Party of Alberta. Yeah. Yeah. And they said that they had a high degree of certainty that that was the case. Would it be possible for the Centurion Project to have gotten this information from somewhere else? Like, could they have bought it from a third-party data broker?

There is a possibility. There parties obviously have people who are in possession of these databases and they are held to strict privacy laws. David Parker told my colleague Carrie Tate that he purchased the information. He didn't say from who or what the information that he bought was. So there's still a lot of questions around that. We're obviously going to see this play out in court. So there's a lot to be seen on how this information was obtained. You talked a bit about David Parker there.

But I'm just curious if David Parker and the leaders of the Republican Party of Alberta have said anything more about these allegations. Yeah. David Parker actually wrote a statement on social media yesterday where he said the allegations that I personally received or distributed any unauthorized voter data are false. These are issues involving active court proceedings and investigations. I will not be commenting further on the operations of the Centurion Project or the media speculation. We will let the legal process unfold.

The leader of the Republican Party of Alberta, Cam Davies, has also said he would cooperate with investigations. What is set to happen next in this case? That's a great question. So we have two separate bodies that are looking at this. The RC&P has opened an investigation into what's happened here. And elections, Alberta has their own injunction. So there will possibly be legal recourse, but we honestly don't really know. We're going to learn more through court filings, potentially hearings over the next several months.

There's a lot that we're going to learn that we haven't yet. So, Matt, we've talked about two, I would say, major legal challenges to the separatist movement in Alberta. Just to end, what do you think will happen to the separatist movement if it is stopped via one of these legal actions? The leaders of this movement, Mr. Sylvester and Mr. Rath are trying to pressure the Premier to have the referendum anyway. So that's one of the realities here. So where does it go next? It's sort of to be seen, depending on which way the courts go. What I think this does speak to with the volume of legal challenges.

And all that we've been hearing about it is this is a decentralized movement that isn't spearheaded by one person or one party. And it's sort of a firm set organization. in Quebec, you obviously have had the Parti-Cabecua in charge of this effort over the years. And so this citizen-led effort, you have all these offshoot groups sort of doing their own thing. And right now you have separatists who some of them are adamant that this is not a big deal. And there are others who are saying this is not good from the movement at all to have this type of data breach sully the movement and sort of taint what momentum it already had. it is definitely throwing a bit of a wrench into the entire movement. There's lots of inviting happening right now.

And it sort of highlights the fact that there's not really an organizing apparatus at the center of this. And it is a fully citizen-led effort. And from what I've heard from separatist leaders is that they don't want to have a centralized effort. They like the setup of having sort of people speaking on different issues here and there and not having one leader that they answer to. Matt, we'll leave it there. Thank you so much. Thanks, Cheryl.

That was Matthew Skace, a staff reporter in Alberta with The Globe. That's it for today. I'm Cheryl Sutherland. Cynthia Jimenez is our intern and associate producer. Our producers are Madeline White, Rachel Levy McLaughlin and Mihal Stein. Our editor is David Crosby. Adrian Chung is our senior producer, and Angela Pichenza is our executive editor. Thanks so much for listening.