ALBERTA PREMIER TOP SEPARATIST
Alberta Separatists Accused of ‘Treason’ After Secret Meetings With Trump Officials
“To go to a foreign country and to ask for assistance in breaking up Canada, there’s an old-fashioned word for that,” said one provincial premier.
British Columbia Premier David Evy gestures toward a Canadian flag while meeting with German President Frank-Walter Steinmeier during a harbor tour on April 25, 2023 in Vancouver.
(Photo by Britta Pedersen/picture alliance via Getty Images)
Brett Wilkins
Jan 29, 2026COMMON DREAMS
The leader of British Columbia on Thursday excoriated separatists in neighboring Alberta who met secretly on several occasions with officials from the administration of President Donald Trump, whose frequent talk of making Canada the “51st state” has tanked relations with the US’ northern neighbor.
The Financial Times reported Wednesday that leaders of the right-wing Alberta Prosperity Project (APP), who want the fossil fuel-rich province to become an independent nation, were welcomed for three meetings with Trump officials in Washington, DC since last April.
APP is reportedly seeking US assistance, including a $500 billion line of credit from the US Treasury Department to help bankroll an independent Alberta, if any potential independence referendum succeeds.
According to the CBC:
Organizers of the Alberta independence movement are collecting signatures in order to trigger a referendum in that province. The pro-independence campaign has been traveling across the province as organizers try to collect nearly 178,000 signatures over the next few months.
“To go to a foreign country and to ask for assistance in breaking up Canada, there’s an old-fashioned word for that, and that word is treason,” British Columbia Premier David Eby, who leads the center-left BC New Democratic Party, said in Ottawa.
“It is completely inappropriate to seek to weaken Canada, to go and ask for assistance, to break up this country from a foreign power and—with respect—a president who has not been particularly respectful of Canada’s sovereignty,” Eby continued.
“I think that while we can respect the right of any Canadian to express themselves to vote in a referendum, I think we need to draw the line at people seeking the assistance of foreign countries to break up this beautiful land of ours,” he added.
APP co-founder Dennis Modry told the Financial Times Wednesday that the separatist movement is “not treasonous.”
“What could be more noble than the pursuit of self-determination, the pursuit of your goals and aspirations, the pursuit of freedom and prosperity?” he asked.
Trump and some of his senior officials have repeatedly expressed their desire to annex Canada, despite polite but vehement Canadian rejection of such a union. Trump’s coveting of Canada comes amid his threats to acquire Greenland by any means necessary, his planning for a possible Panama Canal takeover, and his attacks on Venezuela, Iran, Nigeria, and other countries.
Last week, US Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent poured more fuel on the fire by seemingly encouraging Albertan separatism.
“They have great resources. Albertans are a very independent people,” Bessent said during a media interview. “Rumor [is] that they may have a referendum on whether they want to stay in Canada or not... People are talking. People want sovereignty. They want what the US has got.”
Alberta Premier Danielle Smith of the province’s United Conservative Party said Thursday that she “supports a strong and sovereign Alberta within a united Canada,” even as critics—including Indigenous leaders—accuse her of making it easier for a pro-independence petition to succeed last year.
Smith said the she expects US officials to “confine their discussion about Alberta’s democratic process to Albertans and to Canadians.”
With Trump administration watching, Canada oil hub faces separatist bid
By AFP
January 29, 2026
A view of the Horizon CNRL oil sands site in Fort McMurray in Canada's Alberta province, where an independence movement has been bubbling - Copyright GETTY IMAGES NORTH AMERICA/AFP/File Ian Willms
Ty Ferguson with Ben Simon in Toronto
On a frigid night in Canada’s oil capital, Jordan Fritz joined a rally of thousands for a separatist movement once considered a sideshow, but which is now drawing interest from US President Donald Trump’s administration.
“We need the Americans’ support,” said Fritz, a burly, bearded man with the flag of Alberta — western Canada’s oil-rich province — draped around his shoulders.
“We need pipelines here in Alberta. We need them to be built. We need them to flow oil, and if the Canadian government isn’t going to help us with that, I’m sure the Americans will,” Fritz told AFP at a Calgary roadhouse.
Unlike the decades-old, highly organized independence movement in French-speaking Quebec, Alberta’s fractious separatist camp has not previously threatened Canadian unity.
Western Canadian resentment of eastern political elites is not new, but political scientist Frederic Boily said the idea of an independent Alberta only began to crystallize around 2018.
Albertans broadly opposed then-prime minister Justin Trudeau, viewing his climate-conscious government as hostile to an oil and gas sector crucial to the local and Canadian economies.
“It was at first mainly an economic idea, about no longer paying for the rest of Canada,” Boily, a professor at the University of Alberta, said of Alberta’s independence movement.
Trudeau is gone, replaced by Prime Minister Mark Carney — an Albertan who has backed initiatives to support the oil industry, drawing scorn from environmental groups.
But despite those shifts, the province’s independence push is more prominent than ever and may secure the right to a referendum this year.
Elections Alberta has approved a citizens’ petition initiative from a group called the Alberta Prosperity Project.
If the group collects 178,000 signatures by May 2, they will be on track to secure an independence vote this fall.
– ‘Natural’ US partner –
Current polling indicates the separatists would lose. A January 23 Ipsos survey found just 28 percent of Albertans would vote to secede.
The possible significance of interventions from Washington remains unclear, but Boily said: “It’s certain that the agitation south of the border has an impact on what is happening in Alberta.”
US Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent offered veiled backing for Alberta’s independence last week.
“Alberta has a wealth of natural resources, but they won’t let them build a pipeline to the Pacific,” Bessent said.
“I think we should let them come down into the US, and Alberta is a natural partner for the US. They have great resources. The Albertans are very independent people.”
Reporters asked Carney on Thursday about Bessent’s comments and a Financial Times report that State Department officials had met with Alberta separatists multiple times.
“I expect the US administration to respect Canadian sovereignty,” Carney said.
In response to a question about the Alberta meetings, a senior State Department official told AFP Thursday: “The Department regularly meets with civil society types. As is typical in routine meetings such as these, no commitments were made.”
– All about oil –
Some at the roadhouse rally wore cowboy hats. Others, like Jesse Woodroof, had on baseball caps that said “Alberta Republic.”
Woodroof told AFP his ancestors arrived in what is now Canada “hundreds and hundreds of years” ago.
He voiced concern about “immigrants pouring into this country,” and implied that a sovereign Alberta would take a different approach.
Jennifer Wiebe — her daughter resting against her chest — said: “Alberta could be more prosperous and free on our own.”
While the views expressed may vary, conversations about Alberta independence typically circle back to oil.
Right-wing Premier Danielle Smith, an outspoken oil industry advocate who despised Trudeau’s leadership, has said she supports “Alberta sovereignty within a united Canada.”
Speaking on her weekend radio program, Smith implied the motivation for independence has diminished because Ottawa appears open to a new pipeline.
“I’m forging a new relationship with Canada. We’ve got a new leader, we’ve got a new prime minister… and we seem to have common cause on trying to get a new pipeline built,” she said.
The leader of the separatist Bloc Quebecois, Yves‑Francois Blanchet, drew smirks with his May critique of Alberta’s prospective independence.
“The first idea is to define oneself as a nation,” he said, adding nations need “a culture of their own.”
“I am not sure that oil and gas qualifies to define a culture.”
