Approximately 200 supporters attended to hear the perceived leader of the UCP leadership contest speak.
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Danielle Smith brought her campaign for the UCP leadership to the city of Chestermere on Tuesday afternoon, rallying support for her bid to become Alberta’s next prime minister.
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A crowd of about 200 supporters packed Chestermere’s Lakeside Golf Club, just east of Calgary, to hear the pageant’s perceived leader talk about her platform for Alberta sovereignty, problems in the health care system and how she would ensure a UCP government in the next provincial spring. choice. Smith spoke for about an hour before taking questions from attendees for another half hour.
“The United Conservative Party is the right vehicle. Now we just need the right leader for it,” he said, filling the room with applause from the audience.
Smith was joined by former MLAs Bruce McCallister and Rob Anderson who previously represented rides encompassing the Chestermere area and were members of the Wildrose Party led by Smith. The two were part of the nine-member Wildrose group, including Smith, who crossed the floor to join Jim Prentice’s ruling Progressive Conservatives in 2014.
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Anderson is also chairman of the Smith campaign and co-author of the Free Alberta Strategy, a policy proposal that largely inspired Smith’s campaign promise of an Alberta Sovereignty Act.
Smith said the law, which has been criticized by other leadership candidates, would allow Alberta not to “enforce any federal law that violates our provincial jurisdiction or the rights of our citizens,” comparing the proposed legislation in part to the declaration of the City of Calgary from a climate emergency.
“(Mayor Jyoti Gondek) wanted to send a message to 15,000 public officials that every decision they make needs to be looked at through that lens,” he said.
“We declare the Alberta Sovereignty Act; we’re going to send a message to 256,000 bureaucrats that every decision they make needs to be looked at through the lens of ‘Does this put Alberta first?’”
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Smith said progressives have largely rallied around the NDP, noting that he hasn’t seen a poll “where (NDP leader Rachel Notley) got less than 37%,” drawing silent applause from a only NDP supporter in the audience.
With the NDP polling head to head with the UCP, a month of July Leger survey put Notley ahead by four percentage points among decided voters, and the rise of rural-focused conservative parties like the Wildrose Independence Party and the Buffalo Party, Smith warned the crowd not to split the vote on the next provincial elections next spring. She said the split is similar to what she saw in her days with Wildrose Party.
“When rural Alberta feel disrespected, they form their own party,” he said.
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“If we split the vote now, there will be enough of a difference in Calgary and Edmonton that Rachel Notley can form a majority government and I for one don’t want that to happen.”
The Chestermere rally was one of the latest efforts by Smith to sell party memberships before Friday, the deadline for new members to vote in the Oct. 6 leadership election. Smith left Chestermere to address a debate with her and her fellow leaders Brian Jean and Travis Toews at Rooftop YYC in Calgary.
Smith, Jean and Toews have multiple events and meetups planned for the rest of the week before Friday’s membership deadline.
A total of seven people are running for UCP leadership: Smith, Jean, Toews, Leela Aheer, Todd Loewen, Rebecca Schulz and Rajan Sawhney.
Twitter: @miguelrdrguez
