Fourteen recall petitions up, fourteen recall petitions down

By medicinehatnews on March 4, 2026.

Another recall petition has failed, with two more being deemed invalid.

Elections Alberta has completed petition verification for the petition to recall Jason Stephan, MLA for Red Deer-South. It says after conducting the preliminary count, it was confirmed there were insufficient signatures to meet the required threshold, and the verification count ended.

A total of 4,255 signatures were collected out of the 14,508 required.

Two other petitions, for Athabasca-Barrhead-Westlock MLA Glenn Van Dijken and Lethbridge-East MLA Nathan Neudorf were considered invalid, as applicants failed to submit collected signatures by the end of the 90-day canvassing period.

Signatures for the petitions to recall Brooks-Medicine Hat MLA Danielle Smith and Cypress-Medicine Hat MLA Justin Wright come due on March 10 and March 23, respectively.

In Lethbridge, the recall effort for Neudorf made headlines when organizers ignored calls from the public and media, lending to rumours that the effort was launched with the purpose of blocking others from starting one, with no intention of collecting signatures.

Fourteen of 24 recall petitions launched against UCP MLAs have now failed. The first recall petition to be launched was against Smith’s Education Minister Demetrios Nicolaides. After three months of collecting signatures the campaign wrapped with about 6,500 names, or 40 per cent of the total needed.

No other petition has collected more signatures or achieved a higher percentage since.

Other members of Smith’s cabinet to have a petition against them fail include Advanced Education Minister Myles McDougall, Indigenous Relations Minister Rajan Sawhney, Agriculture Minister R.J. Sigurdson and Service Alberta Minister Dale Nally.

Two petitions launched against members of the Opposition NDP are also approaching the deadline.

The petition against education critic Amanda Chapman, launched by a Calgary resident over Chapman’s support for public sector unions, is due to Elections Alberta on Wednesday.

Petitioners have three months to collect signatures equal to 60 per cent of the total number of votes cast in their constituency in the 2023 provincial election.

If successful, a constituency-wide vote would be held on whether the politician keeps their seat. If the member loses, a byelection would be held.

–with files from The Canadian Press

15
-14