Will Captain Canada Please Stand Up?

Only Nixon could go to China. Only Poilievre can go to Alberta. But will he?

On Monday, Donald J. Trump takes office as the 47th President of the United States. His return to the White House is bad news for Canada, notably, his threat of massive tariffs that could trash our economy. We'll know on Monday exactly what he has planned, but if he goes through with 25% tariffs on all our exports, he will put 2.4 million Canadian jobs at risk and lower our GDP by up to 5 per cent. It will make the economic troubles of the last two years look like a tea party.

This is the greatest political crisis Canada has faced in a generation. It demands a strong, united, national response. At the eleventh hour last week, Prime Minister Justin Trudeau convened Canada’s premiers and territorial leaders to hammer one out, but failed. While they agreed on many points, one major issue remains unresolved: Alberta's oil production and its role as a bargaining chip. The federal government wants to keep it on the table, so Alberta Premier Danielle Smith chose not to sign the group’s final communiqué.

Smith then took to social media. “Stop threatening the livelihoods of tens of thousands of Albertans & Canadians via an energy export tax or ban,” she posted to X. She likened an export tax on oil to the National Energy Program enacted in the 1980’s by Trudeau’s father, Prime Minister Pierre Elliott Trudeau, which cost thousands of Albertans their jobs and spawned the infamous bumper sticker, “Let the Eastern Bastards Freeze in the Dark.”

Smith’s stance is understandable: she’s defending her province, which has seen this movie before. But it’s also a problem, because the circumstances today are very different. This isn’t an internal fight between Ottawa and Edmonton, but a David and Goliath battle with the United States, both our greatest ally and our greatest threat, run by a president who openly muses about taking over other nations. Smith’s very public spat is undermining Canada’s united front - and taking our most important export out of the mix.

Canada’s biggest leverage with the U.S. is oil. We ship out over 4 million barrels a day, making us the largest foreign supplier of crude to the American market. While it’s true that completely turning off the taps isn’t feasible— some of this oil transits through the U.S. to Canadian refineries - we can make it more expensive or limit the amount we export to create leverage. It is the key pain point in any negotiations with Washington: an Angus Reid poll found that among Americans who support tariffs, 62% would change their mind were the price of gas to rise between 30 and 70 cents a gallon.

Trudeau and the premiers, led by Ontario’s Doug Ford, have called on Smith to reconsider. But neither has the power to make this happen. Ford, as a fellow premier, has no authority over Alberta. And Trudeau lacks the moral authority: most Albertans view him with disdain, and rightly so. For a decade he has been cheering the eventual demise of the oil industry, imposing a national carbon tax and most recently, emissions caps. He is reaping what he sowed, but unfortunately, so are the rest of us.

This leaves one person who can potentially convince Smith to stand with the rest of Canada: federal Conservative leader Pierre Poilievre.

Poilievre is Alberta-born, a populist, a staunch ally of the oil patch and an ardent opponent of the carbon tax. He has consistently stood up for Alberta, and has built up the trust that he would do so again. Poilievre is thus uniquely positioned to be Canada’s “Nixon going to China”—a leader whose credibility allows him to take a political risk in the interest of the greater good.

Nixon's reputation as a staunch anti-Communist gave him political cover when he went to Beijing in 1972, ending twenty-five years of isolation between the United States and the PRC, paving the way for establishment of diplomatic relations between the two countries in 1979. Similarly, Poilievre could rally Alberta in a united front against the United States, leveraging Canada’s oil as a powerful tool in negotiations. He could broker a deal that would see Ottawa compensate the oil patch for a certain amount of losses, in exchange for their support. Poilievre could act as a bridge between Alberta and the rest of Confederation, and propose a constructive solution, positioning himself not as opposition leader, but as a statesman: Captain Canada.

But will he?

Alberta is Poilievre's base. He has mined anti-Ottawa sentiment there for over two years, from the Freedom Convoy to his Axe the Tax election slogan. Taking a stand that would harm the province’s oil sector could alienate his supporters, and cost the Conservative party fundraising dollars. And it would mean cooperating with Trudeau, rather than criticizing him.

But if Poilievre does not meet the moment, the consequences could be dire. Trump is already musing about annexing Canada - but, as I've previously written, what part does he want? Conservative, resource-rich Alberta is prime pickings - and Albertans are more receptive than any other part of Canada to the idea of joining the U.S. Cue a “Wexit” national unity crisis, in addition to our economic woes.

The irony is that politically, change is coming - and it's going to put an Albertan in the Prime Minister's chair. And we're not talking about Poilievre, who is widely expected to win the next federal election. Both front-runners for the Liberal leadership—Chrystia Freeland and Mark Carney—are Alberta-born. While both have previously supported the carbon tax, they are now distancing themselves from the policy, at least Trudeau's version of it. One of them will be Prime Minister after March 9, which means that when you include Stephen Harper's tenure, Canada will have had an Albertan as Prime Minister for nearly ten of the past 25 years. That hasn’t happened since, well, ever. So much for the province being an outsider in Ottawa.

This leaves Poilievre with a historic opportunity. If he acts to bring Alberta into a united national strategy, he could cement his status as “Captain Canada,” by standing up to Trump, saving Confederation and averting a national unity crisis. If he sides with Smith, he could see his support in the rest of the country blow away like a tumbleweed in a prairie wind, especially if tariffs decimate the economy. And if Canada cracks apart, he won't have a country to govern at all.

Decisions, decisions. Monday is D-day. It’s the time for all good men - and women - to come to the aid of their country. There’s no time to waste.