Alberta Premier talks about recent Florida trip on ‘Your Province, Your Premier’ | Globalnews.ca
Alberta Premier Danielle Smith took to the airwaves on Saturday for her bi-weekly radio program ‘Your Province, Your Premier’ that airs on Corus Radio, a division of Corus Entertainment.
During the one-hour program, Smith took questions and calls from Albertans across the province. Topics ranged from her recent trip to Florida where she sat down with right-wing podcaster Ben Shapiro at a private fundraising event to interprovincial trade and the growing number of measles cases.
Smith defended her Florida trip, saying that talking to American influencers and supporters of U.S. President Donald Trump is the best way to get her message across.
“Any work that we can do collectively to minimize, reduce or delay any tariffs is good for all of us,” Smith told host Wayne Nelson. “He (Shapiro) devoted his entire podcast to talking about how terrible tariffs were for American businesses… and that’s what we wanted to accomplish.”
That sentiment is fine, but it’s other partisan motives behind Smith’s messaging, such as her March 8 interview with the right-wing news outlet Breitbart, that has many speaking out against the premier.
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“She was telling the (U.S.) administration, ‘pause the tariffs.’ Not because it’s the right thing to do — which it is — but she was basing it out of partisan interest,” said Mount Royal University political scientist Duane Bratt. “Then (she) went on to say it’s hurting the conservatives and you would rather have Pierre Poilievre as the leader of Canada, as he’s more in line with the Trump agenda.”
Aside from that, Smith has also been criticized for not being on board with the one-Canada approach to fighting U.S. tariffs due to her demand that oil and gas exports be exempt from any retaliatory measures. Both former prime minister Justin Trudeau and newly elected Liberal leader Mark Carney have said that won’t happen.
Without that exemption, Alberta’s deficit forecast could increase further, according to Bratt. “We are projecting a $5-billion deficit because of the impact of tariffs,” he said. “That deficit could rise up to $10 billion.”
According to Smith, Alberta loses $700 million for every dollar the price of oil dips below its benchmark and the dollar differential between Western Canada (WCS) and West Texas Intermediate (WTI). So, if the price of oil drops from $68 per barrel to $66 per barrel, the result is a $1.4-billion dollar budget shortfall.
During her radio broadcast, Smith said she hopes discussions on reducing inter-provincial trade barriers can help offset that pain.
“We all agreed that we were going to work on economic corridors to get our product to market,” Smith said. “Oil, gas, transmission lines, roads, broadband, rail lines, new port infrastructure… I am delighted to see that, at the sub-national level, we have unity on that.”
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