Alberta New Democratic Party leader Naheed Nenshi does not currently hold a seat in the Alberta Legislature and has announced he will run for Rachel Notley's recently vacated seat in Edmonton-Strathcona in a by-election.
Nenshi is synonymous with Calgary thanks to his 11 years as mayor and has confirmed he is not moving to Edmonton in a social media post. "This doesn't mean I'm leaving Calgary behind!" Nenshi wrote.
How can he run to represent an Edmonton riding, then? To find out, Taproot caught up with Duane Bratt, a professor who teaches international relations and public policy at Mount Royal University in Calgary.
"It's up to voters, and we replicate the British parliamentary system," Bratt told Taproot about Nenshi's decision and options.
Bratt said Nenshi, who won the NDP leadership in June and did not run to be a member of Alberta's legislative assembly in the 2023 provincial election, fits the definition of a "parachute candidate" in this scenario. Such candidates are people who parachute into a riding located far from where they live in order to secure election to a legislature. Other examples of parachute candidates in Alberta include Premier Danielle Smith, who returned to the legislature by winning a by-election in Brooks-Medicine Hat in November 2022, after already being handed Alberta's premier role by winning the United Conservative Party leadership contest to replace former leader and premier, Jason Kenney, in October 2022.
Notley, who led Alberta as premier from 2015 to 2019 and the NDP from 2014 until 2024, vacated the Edmonton-Strathcona seat on Dec. 30. The rules dictate the United Progressive Conservative government must call a by-election by June 30. It has yet to do so.
Bratt said provincial candidates have always been allowed to run in any riding, regardless of where they live, and that holds true federally as well. Bratt also said Nenshi's choice of where to run makes sense for political reasons, and that the UCP has options to add politics to it all, too.
Nenshi, for his part, said in a post that running in Edmonton does not change much about who he is. "While still proudly Calgarian, I'm already dividing my time between the two cities and I'm looking forward to learning more about Edmonton," he wrote in his social media post.
Why Edmonton-Strathcona?
Bratt said Nenshi's decision of where to run makes sense. "It's the safest NDP riding in the province," he said. The numbers back him up. Notley held the seat for nearly 17 years. In the 2023 election, Notley running for the NDP received 80% of the vote, and Edmonton-Strathcona received the lowest number of votes for the UCP of any riding.
Former Calgary mayor and current Alberta New Democratic Party leader Naheed Nenshi has announced he will run in a by-election Edmonton-Strathcona despite living in Calgary. (Supplied)
What took Nenshi so long to run?
Premier Smith has suggested Nenshi should have found a seat sooner. Nenshi, meanwhile, has said he did not want to ask one of his colleagues to step down in their riding to make way for him. Nenshi could have run in the Lethbridge-West by-election (which the NDP's Rob Miyashiro won on Dec. 18), but said he was more interested in Calgary and Edmonton due to his familiarity with them.
Bratt said there are a few possible reasons for Nenshi choosing to wait. One, he needs to work in Edmonton as opposition leader. Two, living in Calgary and working in Edmonton makes Lethbridge out of his way. Three, waiting for the right riding is less time-sensitive for an opposition leader than it is for a premier.
"I understand the reasons why he's doing this," Bratt said. "This is not unprecedented; this is actually quite common." He later added that there's a "fundamental difference" between being the premier, like Smith was (when she secured the Brooks-Medicine Hat seat) and leading the opposition.
Though some may not understand this, in our electoral system, premiers don't even need to win a riding to hold the province's top job, Bratt explained. There is no constitutional requirement for premiers to have seats at the assembly, and the same is true federally. Party leaders need not be a member of Parliament to become prime minister, which could be the case for Mark Carney.
Still, Bratt said that it's not politically feasible to last in a top job like premier or prime minister without holding a seat. Without one, the premier cannot address the legislature, though they can appoint envoys to speak on their behalf.
When will the by-election take place?
The by-election in Edmonton-Strathcona must legally be called by June 30. Bratt said the UCP's most logical move to serve its own political interests is to wait as long as possible. He said this is what they did for Lethbridge-West, which former NDP MLA Shannon Phillips vacated by resigning on July 1.
The UCP also chose not to hold a by-election in Calgary-Elbow after Doug Schweitzer announced he was vacating his seat as of September 2022. The seat was filled by the general election in May 2023. The NDP's Samir Kayande narrowly won the riding in 2023.
Dave Climenhaga, the author of AlbertaPolitics.ca, has written that one complexity of the by-election in Edmonton-Strathcona is the spectre of a federal election that could take place at or around the same time.
What might the UCP's strategy be for the by-election?
"They're not going to defeat Nenshi in (Edmonton-)Strathcona," Bratt said.
He said that there are two options the UCP could pursue, even if defeat is a foregone conclusion.
"What they could do is weaken him by throwing up a strong campaign," Bratt said. "Or, they could finally say: 'No, he's going to win' — but they won't say that. They'll say: 'Out of respect, we won't run a candidate.'"
He said that sometimes parties don't even bother to run a candidate against a party leader in a by-election. However, the NDP ran Gwendoline Dirk against Smith in the 2022 by-election in Brooks-Medicine Hat. "The NDP put a lot of force into fighting Smith, because they thought if they could defeat Smith in her by-election, it would force her out of office," Bratt said.
Whatever the UCP decides to do about Edmonton-Strathcona, the next provincial election is currently scheduled for Oct. 18, 2027.