So with the UCP deciding that the Justice Minister, who is under threat of recall, should have the power to decide which recalls are valid.
Does this mean that the only valid recall petition is now the one against NDP er Amanda Chapman?±
Not quite, this latest bill only gives him power to decide which citizen led petitions are allowed to advance. It does not impact the recall process, yet.
But it is still equally authoritarian to give a political official authority over which citizens can have a petition to referendum and which cannot. Basically every petition that goes against the UCP's interests will be shut down and only petitions that further rile up their base will go ahead.
Calgary-Beddington, Amanda Chapman NDP
Calgary-East, Peter Singh
Calgary-Peigan, Tanya Fir
Red Deer-North, Adriana LaGrange
Cant wait to be one of the ************* that signs the one for Fir
At the very least it will be funny when
All of the UPC petitions come up with 5000-10,000 signatures.
And the NDP recall, they only collect a few hundred,
and misses the filing deadline,
then lies about how many signatures,
then gives all the names to some fundraising pac,
then have news articles written about how they could face charges for sharing personal information gathered in the recall process,
then some how get off scott free.
Wow - that’s really slimy. Should be allowed to start a new application there.
Chris Spearman thinks Nathan should have to resign for this.
Lisa put out a video about this and she really just says everything we've already seen. Although the bit about the guy's writing changing for his middle name is new info and also weird.
What's interesting though is that she is bleeping out a bunch of the information about who started the petition in Lethbridge-East. I am guessing a lawyer instructed her to bleep out info to CYA?
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Operation Total Recall (23/44* recalls in motion):
3 targeted - Meaning someone has stepped up to be the proponent for the petition (Step 1 in their process)
3 Initial Paperwork Submitted - Paperwork has been filed with $500 payment (Step 2)
3 Initial Paperwork Approved - Petition has been approved and Elections Alberta is awaiting comment from the targeted MLA for up to 7 days (Step 3)
0 Organizing - This is the step immediately before gathering signatures, likely where they are getting people signed up to be canvassers, etc. (Step 4)
14 Gathering signatures (Step 5)
Highlights on the progress update:
I am glad for Calgary-East moving to Approved as they only require 8593 signatures to succeed.
Smith's riding has submitted paperwork.
Calgary-Cross is still 'targeted' and really needs to get paperwork submitted as that riding is another really strong target as it only needs 9083 signatures and he barely won his election by 514 votes.
Operation Total Recall update (24/44* recalls in motion):
1 targeted - Meaning someone has stepped up to be the proponent for the petition (Step 1 in their process)
1 Initial Paperwork Submitted - Paperwork has been filed with $500 payment (Step 2)
2 Initial Paperwork Approved - Petition has been approved and Elections Alberta is awaiting comment from the targeted MLA for up to 7 days (Step 3)
3 Organizing - This is the step immediately before gathering signatures, likely where they are getting people signed up to be canvassers, etc. (Step 4)
17 Gathering signatures (Step 5)
Love to see more and more of those petitions moving into gathering signatures. Hopefully for each of these recall petition canvassers are doubling down on the private school and coal mining petitions. Each one of these citizen led initiatives that get across the finish line is another grenade that the UCP needs to handle where the people are clearly pushing back on their terrible governance.
I have always voted in every election that I have had an opportunity to.
It makes me wonder though. The number of recall votes is tied to the number of votes in the previous election. If I felt the UCP was going to win in a landslide, would it be better if I had not voted which would make the recall a bit easier?
I have always voted in every election that I have had an opportunity to.
It makes me wonder though. The number of recall votes is tied to the number of votes in the previous election. If I felt the UCP was going to win in a landslide, would it be better if I had not voted which would make the recall a bit easier?
Just something that popped into my head.
Doesn't really matter, they would just change the rules if it looked threatening. It's not like any of these are going to be seen through to completion. No government is going to sacrifice their own MLA's on principle, certainly not this one.
I have always voted in every election that I have had an opportunity to.
It makes me wonder though. The number of recall votes is tied to the number of votes in the previous election. If I felt the UCP was going to win in a landslide, would it be better if I had not voted which would make the recall a bit easier?
Just something that popped into my head.
Not surprisingly, it is just another mechanism that the conservatives have built to make voters question whether they should even show up to vote. They are really big on voter suppression, just look at how their rule changes impacted the municipal election and caused many people to give up and not vote.
My take away is that we need electoral reform to replace the FPTP system with a PR or MMPR system. My preference is MMPR because that system still has riding level candidates driving local votes but then the total votes that each party receives will elect some non-riding representatives too in alignment with the popular vote.
MMPR makes everyone's vote count. Having all votes count with the same weight as any other vote in the province / country is how you empower people and increase voter turnouts. It also gives you more accurate results as to how the government represents the people.
Implementing the new system might not see immediate results provincially as it would take time for people to adjust their thinking but if it could encourage voter turnouts closer to 90% instead of 60% then that would be better for our democracy.
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60% of the votes is a pretty high bar. I wonder if any of them will succeed. I saw that the recall Nicolaidis petition is at over 4000 at the halfway point. But 16,000 are needed. I think it’s going to be pretty tough. I think the Forever Canadian petition was at 66% at the halfway point.
The number of signatures needed is probably gonna be too many for a lot of these recalls. I (for some stupid reason) signed up to canvas in the NW riding and while the interest and turnout has been steady, it feels like the rate we are getting signatures lags behind where it would need to be to hit the target. With the limited number of volunteers, limited time, and winter weather, it'll be tough to get the word out and get the numbers we need.
It is also kind of depressing hearing some UCP supporters when they come talk to us. Most just have a different opinion, but a couple have been looking for a fight, and honestly think Smith has been the best Premiere ever, that things like the NWC usage and health care privatization are necessary, and that all the recalls are NDP or union led initiatives.
Last edited by Kerplunk; 12-11-2025 at 11:38 AM.
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The number of signatures needed is probably gonna be too many for a lot of these recalls. I (for some stupid reason) signed up to canvas in the NW riding and while the interest and turnout has been steady, it feels like the rate we are getting signatures lags behind where it would need to be to hit the target. With the limited number of volunteers, limited time, and winter weather, it'll be tough to get the word out and get the numbers we need.
It is also kind of depressing hearing some UCP supporters when they come talk to us. Most just have a different opinion, but a couple have been looking for a fight, and honestly think Smith has been the best Premiere ever, that things like the NWC usage and health care privatization are necessary, and that all the recalls are NDP or union led initiatives.
I'll speak to this point specifically as I live in the NW riding. While there have been a steady number of times/places set up to collect signatures I have found that many are at times that don't work for myself and I assume for many others. Looking again just now there are a number set up for this weekend which is good. But during this past week they all seemed to be set up for times like 3:00 - 5:00pm when it would have been impossible for me to get home from work in time to sign.
I'll speak to this point specifically as I live in the NW riding. While there have been a steady number of times/places set up to collect signatures I have found that many are at times that don't work for myself and I assume for many others. Looking again just now there are a number set up for this weekend which is good. But during this past week they all seemed to be set up for times like 3:00 - 5:00pm when it would have been impossible for me to get home from work in time to sign.
For sure, we would like to hit later times as well, or at least try to inform people of the mobile canvasing signup at the website so we can catch more people (or ping me here or the facebook group https://www.facebook.com/groups/1870741813857041/). Most of the events I've made it to are the 3-4:30 ish time frame, and most of the canvassers there also have kids and work to deal with over the later time as well (and some safety concerns), so late setups are less feasible with the small group in the area.
I've been checking to see when I can sign the Highwood recall petition for RJ Sigurdson. Seems there's been nothing setup for signing, and website is now down.
