The Cuckoo Premier: How Alberta's Political Nest Got Hijacked
OPINION — For students of Alberta politics, the recent spectacle of angry citizens braving -30°C weather to demand the recall of Premier Danielle Smith presents a fascinating puzzle.
To understand this peculiar moment, one need not look to political science textbooks, but rather to a page from an ornithology guide.
Behold, the common cuckoo.
The cuckoo, for the uninitiated, is a bird with a notorious reproductive strategy. It doesn’t build its own nest. Instead, it quietly lays its egg in the nest of another, unsuspecting species. When the cuckoo chick hatches, its first order of business is a brutal bit of neonatal real estate: it heaves the host’s own chicks out, condemning them. The duped parent birds then spend their energy raising a giant, shrieking imposter that bears no resemblance to their own brood.
A crude metaphor for the messy birth of the United Conservative Party (UCP) and the premiership of Danielle Smith? Perhaps. But the parallels are so deliciously apt they’re hard to ignore.
Act I: The Egg in the Nest
Our story begins not with a grand merger, but with a quiet, strategic laying of an egg. In 2014, Danielle Smith, then leader of the upstart, further-right Wildrose Party, executed a stunning political manoeuvre. She and nine of her MLAs crossed the floor to join the governing Progressive Conservatives (PCs).
The pitch was unity. The reality was an ideological egg, carefully deposited in the spacious, well-feathered nest of the 44-year PC dynasty. The host party, perhaps flattered or feeling threatened, incubated it.
Act II: The Chick Ejects the Competition
The hatchling did what cuckoo hatchlings do. The 2015 election was the first great heave. Not one of the floor-crossing MLAs was re-elected. More critically, the public’s disgust with the entire conservative infighting spectacle saw them eject the PC government itself, delivering a shocking majority to Rachel Notley’s NDP. The original chicks—the PC dynasty and the Wildrose as an independent force—were both shoved from the nest.
The nest, however, remained. And in the political wilderness, a new entity formed around it. In 2017, the remnants of the Wildrose and PCs “merged” to form the UCP. But let’s be clear: when a bankrupt company is acquired by a more aggressive rival, we don’t call it a “merger of equals.” This was a takeover. The cuckoo’s DNA was now the dominant strain in the new bird.
Act III: Raising the Shrieking Imposter
The host voters—the traditional conservative base—were now left with a choice: raise this new, noisy chick or let the whole nest fall to the NDP. They chose to feed it, delivering the UCP a majority in 2019 under the leadership of Jason Kenney, a figure who could still plausibly mimic the old PC birdcall.
But the cuckoo’s nature will out. Kenney was eventually pecked into resignation by the very populist, ideologically-driven wing he helped empower. And who soared to victory in the ensuing 2022 leadership race? Why, none other than our original cuckoo, Danielle Smith, who had been waiting in the tall grass of talk radio.
Lacking a seat, she didn’t need to build a nest of her own. A loyal MLA in the safe riding of Brooks-Medicine Hat performed a breathtaking act of political self-immolation, vacating her seat so the premier could swoop in and claim it. The nest was now fully occupied.
The Reckoning: The Nest Fights Back
The cuckoo’s strategy is brilliant, but it has a flaw: it relies entirely on the deceived parents not catching on. And in Alberta, the parents have caught on.
The grassroots anger powering the “Recall Danielle Smith” campaign isn’t just about policy. For many, it’s a deep, visceral rejection of the imposter in the nest. It’s the sound of voters who feel the party they nurtured for decades is now being used to champion a philosophy that is not their own—from the relentless use of the Notwithstanding Clause to policies that would make the old Red Tory wing of the PCs blush.
They see a premier who crossed the floor to join a party, contributed to its collapse, and then returned to lead its successor, all without ever winning a general election as leader. They see a party that passed a Recall Act now facing its first serious threat under that very law.
The irony is so thick you could build a nest with it.
So now, these citizens are doing what the host birds in nature never can: they’re trying to push the cuckoo out themselves. They’re organizing with the cold precision of a survival instinct, braving the winter to protest, and wielding the UCP’s own democratic tools against it.
Whether they gather the 60% of signatures needed in Brooks-Medicine Hat is uncertain. But the message is clear: the Alberta electorate is no longer a passive, duped host. They’ve identified the imposter in their nest, and they’re coming for it with a petition in one hand and a very, very cold cup of coffee in the other.
The cuckoo may have won the nest. But it’s discovering that the owners want their property back.
