FILDEBRANDT: A decade after Smith nuked her political career, she stands supreme

It was the most appalling and treacherous move in the history of Canadian politics. And the reverberations of it are still felt in a very real way in Alberta today. On December 18, 2014, an exhausted and internally defeated Danielle Smith was led to a podium like a lamb to the slaughter, by Progressive Conservative Premier Jim Prentice. There, she stood by his side for the cameras as the two announced the unconditional surrender of the Wildrose Party to the 43-year-old PC dynasty. She and eight other Wildrose MLAs were scuttling the official opposition to join the indomitable PCs, leaving the party just a tiny rump in the legislature, tied for seats with the anemic and terminally ill Liberals. Toryland reigned supreme. Negotiations for cabinet positions and policy concessions had fallen through once news of the deal leaked, sparking instant outrage across Alberta, in the PC Caucus and most especially with her erstwhile Wildrosers.Smith and the Wildrose had taken a battering in a rash of by-elections that rejuvenated the PCs under its new leader Jim Prentice, and a troublesome convention a month earlier had left her rattled. The business community and federal Conservative power brokers all flocked to Prentice, and morale in the Wildrose tanked. Two caucus members defected to the PCs, and soon others were in talks. Faced with the collapse of her leadership and party, Smith ended up sitting on the backbenches of the government that she had fought so hard. A few months later, she was defeated in the Highwood PC nomination by a nobody. Wildrose members gathered in Calgary that same evening for the election of her successor, Brian Jean, and shrieked cheers of joy for the defeat of their former leader. It was a brutal end to the political career of someone who had been seen by many as headed for the premier's office..She was hated, and most especially by the Wildrosers who had just months earlier supported her most.The "reverberations" I noted above are — upon reflection — a terribly insufficient adjective to describe the effects of her defection. It was a tsunami that still shapes our politics today. With two-thirds of its caucus moving to the PCs, the media and much of the public considered the Wildrose dead. The supremely confident Tories never paid the Wildrose any further attention, a decision that would prove fatal. The PC government — emboldened by swallowing the official opposition whole — decided to break their own fixed election date and go to the polls a year early on a platform of major tax hikes. Meanwhile, the four-seat NDP had been a quasi-fringe party for decades, but its newly minted NDP Leader Rachel Notley appeared to be the only politician in Alberta who hadn't been caught rolling around in the mud. Considering the Wildrose dead, the Tories felt they had room to maneuver to the left to combat the surging NDP. It didn't work, and the Progressive Conservatives found themselves encircled on two fronts. On May 5, 2015, Pax Toria fell to the barbarians. The NDP swept to power with a large majority — and the left-for-dead Wildrose roared back to life with even more seats than they had won in the election before. The Tories fell to a distant third place, never to recover. Calgary talk radio station QR770 took a huge gamble, letting Smith guest host a show. I listened to her first opening monologue, nearly shaking in rage, as she laid out her version of events from December 2014. I didn't agree with them then, and still don't now. But while I certainly would not have admitted it at the time, she had real guts for putting herself out there like that. I cheered with other Wildrosers as former supporters called into the show, skewering her mercilessly. It was a brutal slug for her, but day by day, she re-earned her listeners' respect, if not their forgiveness. Eventually, the Brian Jean-led Wildrose Caucus lifted the boycott of appearing on her show, although I continued to fume, rudely responding to invitations to join her with the occasional expletive. But even I had to give in at some point. Her show was a must-listen for Alberta conservatives, whether I liked it or not. Fast forward to 2021. COVID-19 madness was in full swing, and the leadership of UCP Premier Jason Kenney faltered as he oscillated between harsh mandates and reopenings. Smith stood nearly alone in the legacy media as a figure willing to rock the boat on the WHO/government/media consensus on lockdowns and vaccine/mask mandates. This ran her afoul with people further up the food chain at her Global News/Corus employer.She quit as host of one of Canada's biggest talk-radio shows and went to work for a business group. Then, she went here to host a show for the Western Standard. On a Western Standard livestream during the November 2021 UCP convention, Smith dropped a bomb, saying, “I would feel like that if the position [UCP leader] was open, I would have to run.”It was a ballsy move, considering that Jason Kenney was in the same room while she said it. But six months later, the job was in fact, open when Jason Kenney was forced to resign from a leadership vote initiated by local constituency associations. Smith asked me around that time what she needed to do to win over angry former Wildrosers. My advice could surmised as thus:Some former Wildrosers had forgiven her but would be hesitant to trust her with their votes again. Others were still angry, but she couldn't personally apologize to every one of them. Instead, I recommended she give them something no other candidate would. Something so bold that they would have no choice but to vote for her, even if they still had hard feelings. And she didn't disappoint. She Leeroy Jenkins(ed) her way to the UCP crown with two key policy planks that did just that: the Alberta Sovereignty Act and zealous protection against future lockdowns and mandates. She ran explicitly and directly against the record of the party she wanted to lead. The other candidates for the leadership spent the race reacting to her. Attacking her. Highlighting her. Dividing the vote amongst themselves against her. On October 6, 2022, she became UCP leader and had herself sworn in as premier a mere five days later. She inherited a caucus with many Kenney-backed MLAs that was largely hostile to her, unhappy that an outsider insurgent replaced their man after his ouster. Without the expected purge that most leaders impose on caucus after a takeover, she won them over to her side with careful and personal caucus management. She quickly reversed the party's losing poll numbers and pulled the UCP back into contention. In the May 29th 2023 Alberta election, she won a mandate from the broader Alberta electorate, securing a majority government against Rachel Notley's NDP. She then passed the Alberta Sovereignty Act, anti-mandate and lockdown legislation and a new Alberta Bill of Rights. Her government has failed to keep a handle on spending and as yet, has not delivered on a promised tax cut. However, the items she has in the plus column and her genuine zeal for shielding Alberta from a hostile federal government have kept her broadly popular with Alberta voters and extremely popular with UCP members. No Alberta conservative premier has even served out a full term in office since Ralph Klein in 2004. Put another way, every single PC or UCP premier for the last 20 years has been forced from office before finishing a four-year mandate. Despite the efforts of some organized opposition, Smith crushed her critics with 91.5% approval in her November 2 leadership review.She stands a very strong chance of defying the bloodletting that has for years defined Alberta conservatism, and lead the UCP into the 2027 election. It's a long, long way from the dark into which she sank a decade ago. If anyone in Alberta would have predicted 10 years ago that Smith would be leading a majority government of united conservatives, we would have had them committed.From the most hated person in Alberta to a potentially historic and generational premier, Danielle Smith's comeback is without parallel anywhere in Canadian political history. Watch 'Hannaford' on Monday at 7:00pm, when Premier Danielle Smith will review the year in Alberta politics and talk about how she came back from the 'floor-crossing' debacle ten years ago.

FILDEBRANDT: A decade after Smith nuked her political career, she stands supreme

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