Graham Thomson

Graham Thomson

Danielle Smith delivers a budget fitting of the NDP during a financial crisis — but Alberta’s economy is not in crisis

Alberta might be landlocked but the province is sinking in a sea of red ink — and red faces. An embarrassed United Conservative government admits its new deficit-riddled budget unveiled Thursday breaks the province’s own law against running deficits — a law the UCP introduced in 2023 when the government was flooded with oil-generated revenue and buoyed by an $11.6 billion surplus.

Graham Thomson

Huge budget deficit has Danielle Smith raging against the immigrants she recently asked for and, of course, Trudeau

To understand Premier Danielle Smith’s headline-grabbing and controversial attack on federal immigration policy last Thursday, you have to look ahead to the Alberta provincial budget being unveiled this Thursday. It’s going to be a doozy. A doozy of a government fiscal deficit, to be precise. We don’t know yet how much, but the current 2025-26 budget is expected to run...

Graham Thomson

Prediction for Danielle Smith and Alberta in 2026: more chaos

The chickens are coming home to roost for Alberta Premier Danielle Smith. And as we prepare for 2026 to dawn, so many chickens are coming home she’s pretty much running a political poultry farm.

Graham Thomson

Showdown between Danielle Smith and Naheed Nenshi fizzles as the premier ducks and runs

In her political with Alberta’s 51,000 striking teachers, Alberta Premier Danielle Smith has exploded the constitutional equivalent of a nuclear bomb and set in motion a possible wildcat strike by thousands of provincial workers protesting her actions. As onlookers yelled “shame” in the legislature’s public gallery early Tuesday morning, Smith’s government swiftly rammed through a piece of legislation, Bill 2...

Graham Thomson

Danielle Smith’s fact-challenged roadshow is a warning to Mark Carney

Alberta wants to be the next Quebec. Or a sovereign province.

Graham Thomson

Alberta’s fanciful separatist movement was the big loser in Monday’s byelections

Alberta’s separatist movement fell flat on its face Monday night in three provincial byelections. The Opposition NDP held on to two Edmonton ridings with leader Naheed Nenshi winning one of them, and the governing UCP was again victorious in the rural riding of Olds-Didsbury-Three Hills.

Graham Thomson

Danielle Smith tries to cloak her threats to Mark Carney but Alberta’s intentions are clear

Here is Alberta Premier Danielle Smith’s reaction to the federal election boiled down to one ominous sentence: “I will not permit the status quo to continue.” It is a threat disguised as an olive branch.

Graham Thomson

First cracks are appearing in Premier Smith’s support among her party

Try as she might, Alberta Premier Danielle Smith has discovered she can’t keep a lid on a brewing scandal threatening her government. It is boiling over into something of a political mutiny. Not enough of a mutiny at this point to capsize Smith’s leadership, but an insurrection nonetheless.

Graham Thomson

Danielle Smith will impact the federal election. Who will benefit remains to be seen

Premier Danielle Smith, the great disrupter of Alberta politics, is now disrupting the federal scene. At least, that’s the perspective of those who don’t know Smith and haven’t followed her career as United Conservative premier the past two years. Smith is in fact all about disruption and even chaos to gain power and influence at both the provincial and federal...

Graham Thomson

Eight weeks ago, Danielle Smith was on a roll. Now it couldn’t be clearer she’s in deep trouble

When Finance Minister Nate Horner tabled Alberta’s provincial budget in the assembly on Thursday afternoon, he and every other government MLA should have been wearing a neck brace. And maybe two for Premier Danielle Smith.

Graham Thomson

An emboldened Danielle Smith has voters wondering what she’s really up to

Alberta’s UCP government never sleeps. It is always up, always moving, always finding new things to chew on. It is the shark of Canadian politics. Just over a week ago, Alberta was fixated on the drama surrounding Premier Danielle Smith’s leadership review at the United Conservative Party’s annual general meeting in Red Deer.

Graham Thomson

Alberta Premier Danielle Smith faces a leadership review this weekend and she knows who she has to keep happy

To survive a leadership review at this weekend’s United Conservative Party convention, Alberta Premier Danielle Smith is relying on two old adages: “dance with the one that brung you”; and “those who fail to learn from history are doomed to repeat it.” That’s why Smith is pandering to the same social conservatives who helped topple Jason Kenney as UCP leader...

Graham Thomson

Danielle Smith is in control of Alberta, but the fringe forces that sank Jason Kenney are trying to pull the premier further to the right

If you were thinking Alberta’s politics is getting particularly crazy these days — you’d be right. I mean, how else to explain why Premier Danielle Smith was recently dabbling in the “chemtrail” conspiracy theory. If you were thinking that’s because Smith has spun out of control — you’d be wrong. Smith is very much in control. She’s just worried about...

Graham Thomson

Political squabbles and finger pointing abound after the Jasper fire. For some leaders two words get left unsaid

Too soon? Is it too soon after the devastating fire that ripped through Jasper last week, creating a human tragedy and an ecological disaster, to talk about the fraught politics of wildfires in Alberta?

Graham Thomson

Naheed Nenshi’s bloodless coup to be crowned Alberta’s NDP leader

It was a bloodless coup. Alberta’s opposition New Democratic Party is now being led by a man who wasn’t even a member of the party until entering the leadership race in March.

Graham Thomson

'They are immoral and they are dangerous': Naheed Nenshi comes out swinging at Danielle Smith and UCP in bid for Alberta NDP leadership

Into the placid waters of Alberta’s NDP leadership race comes a rogue cannonball. Former Calgary mayor Naheed Nenshi ended weeks of speculation Monday afternoon to announce he has entered the contest to replace New Democratic leader Rachel Notley.

Graham Thomson

Danielle Smith uses Sovereignty Act in a stroke of theatre — with an eye on her next act

In a show of defiance that is one part sabre rattling and one part constitutional threat, with a large dollop of political theatre tossed in, Premier Danielle Smith has finally pulled the trigger on using Alberta’s Sovereingty Act. Smith is invoking the controversial act, introduced one year ago, to oppose the federal government’s proposed Clean Electricity Regulations, specifically Ottawa’s insistence...

Graham Thomson

Raising taxes in Alberta is already hard. Danielle Smith will make it (almost) impossible

To fulfil a reckless election promise, Premier Danielle Smith has slapped a pair of handcuffs on herself, figuratively speaking. She wants to prevent her own government — and any subsequent Alberta government — from raising personal taxes. Ever. (Or at least to make the process so difficult as to be nigh impossible.)