Jason Markusoff

While National Newswatch does not keep an archive of external articles for longer than 6 months, we do keep all articles written by contributors who post directly to our site. Here you will find all of the contributed and linked external articles from Jason Markusoff.

Big voter turnout needed for Conservative victory, Poilievre tells hometown Calgary crowd

Big voter turnout needed for Conservative victory, Poilievre tells hometown Calgary crowd

Conservative Leader Pierre Poilievre took his message of change Friday to Calgary, where his supporters will hope there's minimal change as Liberals push for multiple victories in the predominantly Conservative city.Speaking to what organizers said was more than 3,000 people, he stressed the importance of ensuring all their friends and relatives vote in Monday's election.

Red ripple in blue Calgary? Liberals eye record gains in Conservative stronghold

Red ripple in blue Calgary? Liberals eye record gains in Conservative stronghold

A veteran political organizer in Calgary asked Lindsay Luhnau if she'd consider running for the Liberals last fall.It was an easy "no thanks" for Luhnau, director of a local investment co-operative — Justin Trudeau's party was polling miles behind the Conservatives, and the leader's name was mud nationwide, let alone in blue Alberta's biggest city.

Alberta separatists getting organized — a unity challenge for Canada and Danielle Smith's party

Alberta separatists getting organized — a unity challenge for Canada and Danielle Smith's party

Prominent campaigners will push for provincial independence, inside and outside of UCP tent. You don't need to be a Preston-Manning-like soothsayer to imagine western separatist sentiment ticks upward if the Liberals win re-election. You just need to remember 2019 and the Wexit movement. Justin Trudeau's Liberals narrowly won a second term that fall, and disgruntled Albertans and Saskatchewanians self-branded a...

Alberta New Democrats for Carney? It's more complicated than that

Alberta New Democrats for Carney? It's more complicated than that

At the height of the debate about oil pipelines last decade, relations became so strained between the Alberta NDP and the federal wing that ex-premier Rachel Notley wouldn't even say she was definitely voting for Jagmeet Singh's party in 2019. Tensions appear to have thawed. Notley, now in private life, has publicly endorsed the Edmonton Centre NDP candidate in the...

'No democracy': Frustration with Conservatives as Calgary candidates appointed without contest

'No democracy': Frustration with Conservatives as Calgary candidates appointed without contest

Activists organized, sold memberships for nomination races that never happened in Calgary McKnight, Skyview. Several federal Conservative activists in northeast Calgary are criticizing their party after they'd organized and sold memberships for a year or longer in hopes of running in the election, only to watch the party appoint other candidates at the last minute in two key ridings. There...

At Florida gala, Danielle Smith tried to laugh off 51st state rhetoric. Here's what she said

At Florida gala, Danielle Smith tried to laugh off 51st state rhetoric. Here's what she said

CBC News has obtained video of Alberta premier's onstage discussion with podcaster Ben Shapiro. Alberta Premier Danielle Smith's response to a U.S. podcaster's quips about Canada as the 51st state last week was to tell him and a conservative group's Florida donor gala that they'd regret having tens of millions of progressive Canadians voting for the U.S. president, according to...

When Danielle Smith tried explaining Poilievre to Americans, Canadians heard it too

When Danielle Smith tried explaining Poilievre to Americans, Canadians heard it too

Premier saying Conservative leader 'in sync' with Trump rattles both federal and provincial politics. Alberta Premier Danielle Smith came into the federal election campaign hoping her words would leave an imprint.

Alberta cabinet member urges Danielle Smith to remove health minister

Alberta cabinet member urges Danielle Smith to remove health minister

Peter Guthrie calls for Adriana LaGrange to be moved to 'another unrelated ministry' amid AHS probes. A UCP cabinet minister is urging the premier to remove Health Minister Adriana LaGrange from her post while investigations continue into serious allegations a fired Alberta Health Services CEO has made about major health contracts, CBC News has learned.

Former Alberta Health Services  CEO alleges wrongful dismissal in $1.7M lawsuit against province

Former Alberta Health Services CEO alleges wrongful dismissal in $1.7M lawsuit against province

The former CEO of Alberta Health Services has filed a $1.7-million wrongful dismissal lawsuit against AHS and the province, claiming she was fired because she'd launched an investigation and forensic audit into various contracts and was reassessing deals she had concluded were overpriced with private surgical companies she said had links to government officials.

Team Canada mates no more: how tariff threat put Ford and Smith on divergent tracks

Team Canada mates no more: how tariff threat put Ford and Smith on divergent tracks

As Albertans will testify after experiencing the Tory dynasty and the last couple of UCP premiers, conservatives are not all built the same.Jason Kenney took Alberta in directions past Progressive Conservative leaders never dared to, while Danielle Smith rose to leadership by repudiating Kenney's COVID management — and he did his share of rebuking her Sovereignty Act idea.

Lacombe-Ponoka MLA who made derogatory remarks about trans students could return to UCP caucus: Danielle Smith

Lacombe-Ponoka MLA who made derogatory remarks about trans students could return to UCP caucus: Danielle Smith

Premier Danielle Smith is open to letting MLA Jennifer Johnson back into the UCP caucus, but not until after the legislature passes new transgender policies this fall. Johnson was elected last year as a United Conservative member for the Lacombe-Ponoka riding, but the UCP excluded her and made her sit as an Independent because of derogatory remarks she had made...

Inside the pressure campaign on Danielle Smith to make gun ownership (and more) an Alberta right

Inside the pressure campaign on Danielle Smith to make gun ownership (and more) an Alberta right

Premier Danielle Smith intends to strengthen the little-known Alberta Bill of Rights this fall to include protections for people who refuse to be vaccinated, but she's facing heavy pressure from United Conservative activists to go much farther in her overhaul, CBC News has learned. A group from the premier's riding in Medicine Hat, which calls itself the Black Hat Gang...

The cheers and jeers of Danielle Smith's private party summer

The cheers and jeers of Danielle Smith's private party summer

A couple of Tuesdays ago, Premier Danielle Smith's evening began with her facing heat for not rushing to ban COVID vaccines for children. Then it moved on to Smith having to answer about why she wasn't pushing harder to remove Alberta from the Canada Pension Plan. Before the night's end, she also fielded questions on whether she'd legalize property owners...

Helplessness and the Jasper inferno

Helplessness and the Jasper inferno

There's a wash of emotions that surely hit the firefighters having to retreat from the wall of flame, and the Jasper residents learning by social media and rumour that their homes and businesses were lost, and Alberta's premier tearing up while waxing rhapsodically about what was lost and what will be recovered.

So many self-inflicted wounds, so few allies. Alberta's energy war room was long doomed

So many self-inflicted wounds, so few allies. Alberta's energy war room was long doomed

It was never really the war room that former Alberta premier Jason Kenney dreamed of. And even if it had turned out that way, it's not clear it would have worked any better than the pro-oil entity his UCP government actually wound up creating. Either way, the Canadian Energy Centre never seemed to reach its promised potential. And this week...

Shannon Phillips targeted climate and parks action. Then she got targeted. The NDPer is now leaving office

Shannon Phillips targeted climate and parks action. Then she got targeted. The NDPer is now leaving office

The Rachel Notley government's consumer carbon tax wound up becoming a weapon the UCP wielded to drum the Alberta NDP out of office. But that levy-and-repayment program, and the wide-ranging "climate leadership plan" around it, also stood as the NDP's boldest, provincial-reputation-altering move in their single-term tenure. And as the party reignites its bid to return to government this summer...

Albertans think Danielle Smith is bad on affordability. Here's why she isn't paying for it

Albertans think Danielle Smith is bad on affordability. Here's why she isn't paying for it

The three most important issues to Albertans are health care, the cost of living and housing affordability — and fewer than one-third of Albertans think the provincial government is handling any of those files well, according to the latest batch of Janet Brown's polling for CBC News. You might think these findings of public opinion ought to set off multiple...

The 'Redmonton' party no more: Alberta NDP's base has shifted to Calgary

The 'Redmonton' party no more: Alberta NDP's base has shifted to Calgary

You don't have to go far back — 2012, or four elections ago — to find a time when the Alberta NDP hardly registered in Calgary.Sure, they ran candidates, but none of them seriously door-knocked or campaigned. They averaged less than five per cent of the votes in Alberta's largest city in 2012.

Danielle Smith, big government's unlikely fan

Danielle Smith, big government's unlikely fan

When Premier Danielle Smith put forth the ambition of building a multi-city passenger train network to link Banff, Calgary, Edmonton and many other points, the questions came quick: are you setting up Alberta taxpayers for a multibillion-dollar boondoggle or two?

Can't they ever just get along, Justin Trudeau and Danielle Smith? Sometimes, yes!

Can't they ever just get along, Justin Trudeau and Danielle Smith? Sometimes, yes!

In among all the pokey words Premier Danielle Smith flung at the prime minister (and his environment minister) after meeting with Justin Trudeau, one gentler term nudged its way into her rhetoric.Gratitude.That's right. From a premier from this western province to a PM with that surname.

Danielle Smith bets Albertans would rather save than spend — finally

Danielle Smith bets Albertans would rather save than spend — finally

Premier pitches massive Heritage Fund as she shelves tax cut, tightens spending. There's paying attention, and then there's paying for attention. The latter has become quite an Albertan habit. Premier Danielle Smith has picked up the habit that Ralph Klein started in the early 1990s and delivered her second paid-time premier's televised addresses Wednesday — though all the other premiers...

NDP MP wants to treat oil like tobacco. Alberta NDP doesn't smoke the same stuff

NDP MP wants to treat oil like tobacco. Alberta NDP doesn't smoke the same stuff

New Democrat MP Charlie Angus's message this week that the oil and gas sector needs to have its "big tobacco moment" and no longer be advertised positively will play well among the Canadians who largely view fossil fuels as climate-ravaging toxins that must be shunned as quickly as possible. The federal NDP member's message and new private member's bill will...

Ex-mayor Nenshi loathes partisan politics. He may run for Alberta NDP leader anyway

Ex-mayor Nenshi loathes partisan politics. He may run for Alberta NDP leader anyway

Former Alberta justice minister Kathleen Ganley kicked off her bid Monday to lead the NDP, stressing her Calgary roots. By this time next week, Edmonton caucus mates Rakhi Pancholi, Sarah Hoffman and David Shepherd will likely have joined her in the race to replace the departing Rachel Notley. That lineup of leadership candidates has been reported publicly for some time...

Danielle Smith bids to transcend politics with Canada's toughest trans youth rules

Danielle Smith bids to transcend politics with Canada's toughest trans youth rules

Premier Danielle Smith swore for months that she didn't want to politicize issues around the rights and aspirations of transgender, gender-fluid or questioning youth, and has now declared Canada's most restrictive and wide-ranging set of policies governing the rights and aspirations of those same minors. She didn't want to politicize it, and yet there Smith was on Thursday, by herself...

Tucker Carlson brought controversy to Danielle Smith's Calgary — then took her somewhere dicier

Tucker Carlson brought controversy to Danielle Smith's Calgary — then took her somewhere dicier

U.S. commentator presses Alberta premier on convoy-related legal cases. Back at work in Alberta after two weeks of vacation, Premier Danielle Smith chose as her first public appearance in 2024 a conversation on stage with Tucker Carlson, the U.S. commentator whose views and remarks became too much for his Fox News bosses to tolerate. On Tuesday night, they enjoyed a...

Danielle Smith eyes an Alberta go-between for federal-city deals

Danielle Smith eyes an Alberta go-between for federal-city deals

Here's a non-exhaustive list of things that Premier Danielle Smith's government would like to know by month's end:

Danielle Smith warned about 'net-zero' 2035. Alberta power grid's woes showed up early

Danielle Smith warned about 'net-zero' 2035. Alberta power grid's woes showed up early

In white text on black boards, messages that were both visually and rhetorically stark flanked Premier Danielle Smith last fall as she launched a big advertising campaign against Ottawa's clean electricity regulations."No one wants blackouts in –30°C.""No one wants to freeze in the dark."Both statements are universal truths, no doubt.

Notley made Alberta NDP a winner and planted unlikely dream: winning again

Notley made Alberta NDP a winner and planted unlikely dream: winning again

For a sense of how colossal the Alberta NDP's debt is to Rachel Notley, consider this. Their three best election results were in the three under her leadership, the party winning a combined 116 seats in those races. Across the 12 elections before that, the NDP won 51. That's fewer than the number of MLAs elected under Notley's banner in...

In 2024, Alberta NDP decides who it is without Rachel Notley as leader

In 2024, Alberta NDP decides who it is without Rachel Notley as leader

Since at least her days as premier, NDP Leader Rachel Notley has worn the same wristwatch. No luxury wrist bling — it's a digital number, though not as smart as an Apple Watch either. Notley instead relies on the simplicity of a Garmin Forerunner 35 with a silicon wristband. Big digital time display, and it can sync with her phone's...

A matter of time: Danielle Smith is putting in the hours to prevent UCP unrest

A matter of time: Danielle Smith is putting in the hours to prevent UCP unrest

A decade ago this coming spring, Alison Redford resigned as Alberta premier, largely under the crushing weight of revelations of her profligate flight habits. At the time, some commentary wondered why government-funded flying proved fatal to Redford but never seemed to dent former premier Ralph Klein, whose use of provincial aircraft prompted critics to dub the fleet Air Ralph. Was...

Danielle Smith would never accept Ottawa's oil emissions rules, no matter how flexible

Danielle Smith would never accept Ottawa's oil emissions rules, no matter how flexible

It might not have mattered for the Alberta government's reaction that what the Trudeau government promised as a 42-per-cent cap on oil and gas emissions will actually only require that industry to curb emissions by 20 to 23 per cent by 2030. It might also not have been significant that there's ample flexibility and allowances that technology might not be...

Danielle Smith to invoke Sovereignty Act on Ottawa power rules next week, say sources

Danielle Smith to invoke Sovereignty Act on Ottawa power rules next week, say sources

The Danielle Smith government intends to put its Sovereignty Act into action next week to shield Alberta power companies from the proposed federal clean electricity regulations, CBC News has learned. The province will use the controversial law to introduce a resolution in the legislature that declares Ottawa's plan to slash grid emissions an unconstitutional federal measure, and spell out ways...

Preston Manning's fiction made real in his Alberta pandemic report

Preston Manning's fiction made real in his Alberta pandemic report

Preston Manning's report on the government's COVID response concluded that emergency management agencies should lead over the health department, demanded economic impact assessments for any health protections and criticized the courts' deference to "demonstrably justifiable" limits on freedoms.You might think we're referring to the panel report Manning was commissioned to lead for Alberta's government. You'd be partly right.

Danielle Smith's UCP base has big demands. She's wary of going quite that far

Danielle Smith's UCP base has big demands. She's wary of going quite that far

Alberta's premier leads a party whose most active members almost unanimously want the province to refuse to house trans women in women's prisons, and require schools to tell parents if their children want to secretly change their pronouns, as New Brunswick and Saskatchewan have controversially done. United Conservative Party members also voted unanimously at their convention to eradicate diversity and...

Alberta UCP activists want 'control' of party board — but to do what with it, exactly?

Alberta UCP activists want 'control' of party board — but to do what with it, exactly?

David Parker's bespectacled eyes widened as the leader of Take Back Alberta told fellow political activists what will go down at the United Conservative Party's annual convention this weekend. It's different from what most traditional politicos will say is happening at Calgary's BMO Centre — a political schmoozefest where members get to clap thundersticks for leader Danielle Smith, get tipsy...

Danielle Smith's pension numbers suggest bumpy ride for contributors — with cushions removed

Danielle Smith's pension numbers suggest bumpy ride for contributors — with cushions removed

When Danielle Smith says Albertans would save $1,425 a year in an Alberta Pension Plan and other Canadians would pay "only" $175 more, the Alberta premier is trying to excite one group of people and calm the jitters of another. But if these are the numbers Smith is using, then she's adding an extra layer of bumps and uncertainty to...

Danielle Smith's pension trifecta: Trudeau, Notley and Poilievre agree on something

Danielle Smith's pension trifecta: Trudeau, Notley and Poilievre agree on something

It's not clear if Pierre Poilievre had already devised a position on Alberta's proposed quitting of the Canada Pension Plan, but the Conservative leader issued one barely a day after Prime Minister Justin Trudeau proclaimed his own stance. The Liberals' unusually forceful opposition to Alberta Premier Danielle Smith's pension ambition has doubled as a political wedge against Poilievre. Alongside trying...

Pension becomes another Alberta-Ottawa fight. But this time, Trudeau's on offence

Pension becomes another Alberta-Ottawa fight. But this time, Trudeau's on offence

Jim Dinning, engagement panel chair: Thank you, Duane from Camrose. We appreciate all your comments on the potential Alberta Pension Plan. Isn't this telephone town hall format a swell idea? Sarah, please put through the next call. Operator: Our next commenter is Justin, and he's on the line from Ottawa. OK, so it didn't quite happen this way, but may...

Danielle Smith's big-money sales pitch on Alberta pension plan hasn't worked yet

Danielle Smith's big-money sales pitch on Alberta pension plan hasn't worked yet

Prime Minister Justin Trudeau can usually only count on polite applause when he's talking to an Alberta business crowd. But when executives hosted him this week at an Ottawa reception, he found one line worked surprisingly well — praise for the national pension program that Premier Danielle Smith wishes to exit. In a list of federal programs assisting Alberta (health...