Alberta Premier Danielle Smith says a group of Indigenous chiefs need to “check themselves,” after they accused her of potential treasonous activity for calling a separatism vote.
The Assembly of Treaty Chiefs, representing Treaty 6, Treaty 7 and Treaty 8 First Nations across Alberta, unanimously voted to ask the RCMP to look into whether the Alberta referendum amounts to criminal treason by Smith and her United Conservative Party.
The chiefs say the fall referendum is an intentional violation of the treaty relationship and ignores risks to Canada’s sovereignty.
“We call for this investigation on the basis of the intentional violation of the Treaties; of calling a referendum in the face of severe risks to Canada’s sovereignty and the Treaty Relationship and of failing to take action on the violation of privacy rights of millions of people,” said a statement from the assembly on Wednesday.
“Further, Premier Smith and the UCP government have done all this with significant risks of foreign interference and influence.”
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Smith says the accusation is disgraceful.
“Look, I’ve had my differences with the federal government, but I have never used language like that,” Smith said at an unrelated news conference Wednesday afternoon.
“This kind of overwrought language has no place in a democracy.”
She says her government and the assembly have a collaborative relationship and she wants it to continue but that the chiefs’ language has no place in democracy.
“When they were pursuing a new relationship with Ottawa, I cheered them along. We are pursuing a new relationship with Ottawa that respects our jurisdiction ,and I would ask that they be respectful of that,” she added.
Albertans are to vote Oct. 19 on whether they want to remain in Canada or start the process to hold a second, binding referendum on the province quitting Canada.
— More to come…
With files from Karen Bartko, Global News
© 2026 The Canadian Press
