Albertans Vote Today on Whether to Seek a Binding Independence Referendum

Albertans are voting Monday on whether their provincial government should begin the legal process toward a binding referendum on leaving Canada. Polls close at 8 p.m. Mountain time, 9 p.m. Central. Ballots are counted by hand, and the independence question is counted first.

The question, the last of ten on the ballot, asks whether Alberta should “remain a province of Canada” or whether its government should “commence the legal process required under the Canadian Constitution to hold a binding provincial referendum.” Under the order that set it, the result is not binding.

The last pitches

Both of Canada’s main federal parties spent the final days urging Albertans to stay. At a rally in Calgary on Thursday, Prime Minister Mark Carney called for “a decisive result on Monday to settle this question,” CBC News reported. “The world has become more dangerous and divided. Some outside our borders are working to break us so they can own us,” he said, according to the BBC.

Conservative MP Dane Lloyd, who leads his party’s own campaign to keep Alberta in Canada, told CBC on Sunday that the goal was “an overwhelmingly decisive vote for a stronger Alberta within a united Canada.”

Those campaigning for independence said they had already won something. “The key is the conversation has started and it needs to continue,” Chris Scott, founder of Let’s Talk Alberta, told the BBC on the eve of the vote. “What’s started can’t be stopped now.”

Premier Danielle Smith, who opposes leaving Canada, called the vote after a citizen petition gathered about 300,000 signatures. She has said a binding referendum could follow as soon as 2027 if Albertans choose to begin the process.

When results come

Hundreds of thousands of Albertans voted early by mail, the BBC reported. Election officials have 48 hours to finish counting a ballot with seven or more questions, and official results are scheduled for Thursday, October 29.

The Texian Partisan will carry the count for all 87 electoral divisions live tonight from Elections Alberta, starting when polls close at 9 p.m. Central, on its results page. The count is unofficial until Elections Alberta announces it.

Tonight the people of Alberta decide whether to take the first step. Their province’s own government asked them.