Alberta Premier Danielle Smith responded Saturday to comments by U.S. Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent about Alberta separatists, saying she believes they don’t want to join the United States. While appearing on the right-wing TV station Real America’s Voice, Bessent claimed Canada won’t let Alberta build a pipeline to the Pacific. “I think we should let them come down into the U.S., and Alberta’s a natural partner for the U.S.,” he said. “They have great resources. The Albertans are very independent people,” Bessent said, adding there’s a “rumour that they may have a referendum on whether they want to stay in Canada or not.” When asked if he knew something about it, Bessent said, “People (in Alberta) are talking. People (in Alberta) want sovereignty. They want what the U.S. has got.” On her Saturday radio show, Your Province, Your Premier, Smith was asked by host Wayne Nelson about her reaction to Bessent’s remarks, given that a petition was launched earlier this week by a group who want Alberta to hold a referendum on separating from Canada -- as well as First Nations groups launching legal action against it because they believe it violates their constitutional rights. Smith asserted she doesn’t believe separatists have interest in being part of the U.S. “Let’s maintain the U.S.-Mexico (CUSMA) trade agreement as it is,” she said, “and then let’s work on getting resolution on the areas where there’s dispute. “When you look at Alberta, 97 per cent of our goods cross the border tariff-free,” she added. “The areas where there’s problems, -- aluminum, steel, autos, softwood lumber, pharmaceuticals, digital -- let’s get to the table and start negotiating on those particular issues as opposed to thinking there’s something wrong with the (CUSMA) deal as a whole.” Smith pushed back against Bessent’s premise that Albertan separatists want the province to join the U.S. “I would say, when I talk to people (Canadians) who are frustrated with the way we’ve (Albertans) been treated (by Ottawa) for the past 10 years, they don’t say, therefore I want to be an American state. That is not what I am hearing. “They (separatist Albertans) want a new relationship with Canada. And that’s what I’m doing,” she said. “I’m forging a new relationship with Canada. We’ve got a new leader, we’ve got a new prime minister, we’ve got an MOU (Memorandum of Understanding) – and we seem to have common cause on trying to get a new pipeline built. “So that’s what I’m going to keep focused on.” Last week, Alberta NDP leader Naheed Nenshi, in an opinion piece written for CTV News, criticized Smith for cozying up to the most extreme wing of her political base. “Smith, by coddling this extreme faction of her base, has lost control (of the debate),“ Nenshi wrote. ”The United Conservatives have become a separatist party, much to the surprise of many who voted for them and many of her own caucus members. “Indeed,” Nenshi wrote, “after a judge ruled that a referendum on separatism in Alberta would be unconstitutional as written, the government changed the law to allow for one anyway, and to make it easier to force a referendum. (Interestingly, to avoid other referendum petitions, they also increased the cost for future initiatives from $500 to $25,000. The separatists get the old price).” ‘A pressure release valve’ Smith disputed that characterization, describing citizen-initiated petitions as a way for voters to let off a little steam. “You need to have a pressure release valve on issues that people care about and this is something that clearly a motivated group of people care about,” she said. “They want to go out, get signatures, they have, I think, 120 days to do it, and so I’ll wait and see if they’re successful in getting (over) that bar by I think – the end of April." ‘Sovereignty independent of the U.S.’ The Alberta independence movement is collecting signatures for a petition on a referendum question asking whether Alberta should be independent from Canada. Mitch Sylvestre, who is spearheading the petition, said Friday he doesn’t think anyone in his movement wants to join the U.S. “People want sovereignty, and that’s what people in the U.S. have, but we want sovereignty independent of the U.S,” he told The Canadian Press. Sylvestre said he thought Bessent was pointing out the obvious by calling Alberta and the U.S. “natural partners,” given the amount of trade they exchange. Sylvestre said U.S. officials should be paying attention to what’s happening in Alberta — but he’d rather they didn’t comment on his push for independence. “Alberta on its own will do very well,” he said. “A free-trade agreement with the U.S. would probably be good for both sides. Good for us, for sure.” ‘Paint herself as Captain Canada’ In his Jan. 16 opinion piece, Nenshi gave his own interpretation of Smith’s handling of the province’s separatist movement. “Smith’s strategy here has been extremely clear for a long time: use the threat of separatism (which she herself has strongly encouraged) to extract concessions from the federal government, then paint herself as Captain Canada and the one who saved the nation during a referendum,” he said. “Citizens are smarter than most politicians give them credit for,” Nenshi added, “and they will see right through this.” When asked about Bessent’s comments, Finance Minister François-Philippe Champagne said Ottawa is working with Alberta. “We will do our own things and we will be able to develop our resources with Albertans, with Canadians,” Champagne said in Quebec City, where Prime Minister Mark Carney’s cabinet was gathered for meetings. Stay Free Alberta, the group heading the petition on a separation referendum question, is canvassing and needs at least 177,732 signatures by May 2 before the petition can be verified and brought to the legislative assembly. With files from The Canadian Press and CTV Calgary
