The Smith MAGA Ballot, Part I

Trump Lends A Hand In Siccing Anger Against Immigrants

By Gabriel Haythornthwaite, The DNA Report

With 24 days until Alberta’s pre-annexation referendum, The DNA Report is taking a first look at the regressive ballot by reviewing the five anti-immigrant questions cooked up and launched by the Governor Smith cabinet on March 31.

This review comes as Herr Trump snarled a ‘Truth Social’ statement on September 23 pushing immigrant scapegoating in Canada. The Orange Ogre’s putative alert is that “millions” of immigrants are pouring in “essentially unchecked” which will apparently destroy the country--that he seeks to annex and erase!

What interests this journal is less the obvious fact that the President is a gargantuan orange-hued liar; after all, banker-PM Mark Carney quickly dropped the portcullis on immigration after the April 2025 election perhaps to appease Trump and the far-Right. Instead, it is the timing of this Washington intervention close in the lead-up to the Alberta referendum which has five anti-immigration questions on the ballot.

Herr Trump and VEEP JD Vance have already played this tune on Fortress Europe— a continent obsessed with anti-immigrant restrictions yet is nonetheless besieged by Trump-allied fascist parties seeking ‘remigration’, i.e., the mass deportation of non-white citizens and residents. With this set-up in mind, The DNA Report presents this rundown of the first five Governor Smith ballot questions.

Ballot Question 1: Do you support the Government of Alberta taking increased control over immigration for the purposes of decreasing immigration to more sustainable levels, prioritizing economic migration and giving Albertans first priority on new employment opportunities?

The multiply loaded nature of this ‘question’ is immediately apparent. The call to decrease immigration is premised on the fear-mongering idea that current levels are ‘unsustainable’. A supposed preference for ‘economic migration’—an attack on refugees who have a legal right to seek protection in Canada—is coupled with a conflicting claim of wanting Alberta-first employment discrimination.

Ballot Question 2: Do you support the Government of Alberta introducing a law mandating that only Canadian citizens, permanent residents and individuals with an Alberta-approved immigration status will be eligible for provincially-funded programs, such as health care, education and other social services?

Ballot Question 3: Assuming that all Canadian citizens and permanent residents continue to qualify for social support programs as they do now, do you support the Government of Alberta introducing a law requiring all individuals with a non-permanent legal immigration status to reside in Alberta for at least 12 months before qualifying for any provincially-funded social support programs?

Ballot Question 4: Assuming that all Canadian citizens and permanent residents continue to qualify for public health care and education as they do now, do you support the Government of Alberta charging a reasonable fee or premium to individuals with a non-permanent immigration status living in Alberta for their and their family’s use of the health care and education systems?

Questions two through four propose different methods for discriminating against recent immigrants in the areas of public service, particularly in health and education: outright denial; a one-year eligibility period; and a shakedown tax dressed up as a “reasonable fee”.

At a Calgary Chamber of Commerce forum on September 22, Governor Smith suggested a $1900 per year head-tax for healthcare was ‘reasonable’ and in line with model racist jurisdictions like the UK. The next day, Trump sounded his anti-social media clarion to ironically warn Canada about immigrants representing a “Liberal takeover”.

Nervy as that is, even more so is the bizarre website put up by the Smith cabinet to promote the referendum (https://albertareferendum2026.ca). Smith has protested her innocence on the question of separation as a simple civic exercise to give the people a chance to decide on important matters. Her government is neutral on all this. Yet consider this explanatory paragraph in relation to ballot questions two to four:

Federal policies that almost doubled, and then more than tripled, the number of newcomers in the last decade have negatively impacted our immigration system – putting pressure on Alberta’s health, education and other social services, resulting in delayed access to health care for Albertans, larger classrooms for students and unaffordable cost pressures to social services overall.

First off, the breezy assumption that increased numbers of “newcomers” means a “negatively impacted” immigration system. Automatically, it seems. Second, “newcomers” are the reason for health care bottlenecks, degraded public education class conditions and rising costs. Not decades of public funding cuts. Nor rip-off privatization schemes that accelerate the rot in social services. Definitely not the free-hand given to corporate monopolies to fix prices.

How about Bill 11, Governor Smith’s ambitious healthcare privatization legislation? Why not put that to a vote?

Ballot Question 5: Do you support the Government of Alberta introducing a law requiring individuals to provide proof of citizenship, such as a passport, birth certificate or citizenship card, to vote in an Alberta provincial election?

How fortunate the Smith cabal is on guard against another top danger in Alberta today, which is that non-citizens are taking up voting fraud. This does sound weirdly familiar to another country not a million kilometres away.

The DNA Report concludes this review of the five get-the-immigrants referendum questions with another observation and final conclusions. First off, observe the “resources” on the Smith government referendum website. The videos are shameless in their promotion of the goose-stepping ‘yes’ vote.

There is no counter view, obviously. Anyone voting no to ballot questions one to five simply wants endless waves of immigrants granted access to drive up living costs, destroy social services, and/or cheat in elections. You might think that the government and its corporate allies have these three vocations sewn up but you would be wrong.

In terms of conclusions, there are two. First, not only are these reviewed ballot questions obvious scapegoating fare against new immigrants to deflect, as Naheed Nenshi of the NDP noted recently, away from the Smith government’s responsibility for healthcare unraveling and spirally everyday costs. Adding to the political crime at play is the fact that attacks on immigrants around public services is also an assault against the wider public as the rejection of universal access will only aid further chopping and privatization experiments.

The same with voting. There have been numerous civic reviews which demonstrate both that voter fraud in Canada is infinitesimal and that increased identification requirements actively suppress voting, particularly of the poor who funnily enough don’t prioritize passports for foreign travel.

The last conclusion is a connecting thread of the threat that The DNA Report is considering in these reviews of Smith’s regressive ballot. Less than four weeks before Alberta is set to vote in a referendum with five anti-immigrant questions pushed by an absurdly rightwing government website, Herr Trump stomps in to tell Canada—Alberta—that immigrants are overrunning the country with woe and hell to pay coming down the pipe.

How can we think that is a coincidence?

How can we not see the American Annexation political operation underway here?

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Gabriel Haythornthwaite is a former labour-allied school board trustee in BC and currently advises First Nations around political and intergovernmental relations. He is also a leftwing writer and political organizer.