When I stepped off the plane in Mexico, I experienced culture shock. Food, entertainment, customs, language.

Stepping into the Trochu community center June 11, I experienced another culture shock. Not customs, food, or language—I was surrounded by well over 100 Albertans who want to see Alberta step away from the Canadian federation. 

Under the Let’s Talk Alberta umbrella, the Trochu meeting was one of 210 scheduled from February 2026 to October’s provincial referendum. Promoted as an opportunity to rationally examine and talk about Alberta’s place in Canada, the clear focus in Trochu described Alberta as having been neglected, abused, misunderstood, and unappreciated long enough. “Time to leave.”

After the brief opening prayer, Western Standard columnist Cory Morgan stated, “We are making history right now and for the next four months. Alberta’s place in the federation is the most important question.”

Aligning Alberta’s place in Canada to that of a family, Morgan said, “We are not having a tantrum. We are grown up and want to move out. Why? Because no economist can honestly look at the statistics and facts and say our relationship with Canada is fair. It is not fair.”

He added that in the four months to October’s referendum “this campaign will only be won by respectful one-to-one conversations about how Alberta is treated in the federal system. We will not win hearts with vitriolic statements, flyer campaigns, and glitzy advertising.”

The mix of speakers and other message carriers (posters, banners, cards, T shirts, yard signs, ball caps, coffee mugs, banners, hoodies) struck an edgier tone than Morgan’s measured presentation. Alberta’s natural predator—the Eastern mosquito . . . Free Alberta . . . Republic of Alberta . . . From the beginning, Alberta was stolen from—to enrich the East . . . Time for Change . . . Independence is freedom from tyranny . . . make Alberta great again . . . free Alberta from Ottawa . . .

Participants in the Trochu meeting signed in as coming from Medicine Hat, Bowden, Innisfail, Trochu, Three Hills, Drumheller, Delia, and Red Deer County. Not knowing names or faces, I did not identify someone in the audience who was saluted from the platform for involvement in the United We Roll for Canada truck convoy that crippled downtown Ottawa for the better part of three weeks in 2022.

Given that the truck convoy was supposed to be protesting vaccination protocols—not Alberta leaving the Canadian union—I was puzzled that the level-headed speeches by Morgan and fellow presenter Chris Scott also rubbed shoulders with a literature table card showing a man’s face. Half the face was a Nazi officer, the other half a Mountie, with an Adolf Eichmann quote, “I was just following orders.”

Similarly disconnected from a separatist agenda, a literature table sign declared that if the government says you don’t need a gun, you need a gun. A banner containing a quote from a 1904 federal cabinet minister features an inverted Canadian maple leaf dripping blood and then-Minister Clifford Sifton’s face suspiciously doctored with a Hitler moustache.

Scott’s brief time behind the podium was more balanced.

“The cause of Western alienation,” he said, “is that we have not been listened to and cannot continue just listening to each other. It’s time to make proper decisions. Alberta independence is not only necessary, it is inevitable. I see the October referendum as a tremendous opportunity for Albertans to make a great decision. Let’s keep talking.”

Rural Alberta Report/David Nadeau