Undaunted by Rebel News commander Ezra Levant’s recent back-and-forth with Elections Canada over the post-campaign returns filed on behalf of ForCanada, the third party advertising group he set up during last year’s federal election, the avowedly right-leaning media outlet “is going all in on Alberta’s independence referendum,” Levant advised his audience this week.

As the accompanying staff-written recap notes, they’re “officially registering as a third-party campaign group in Alberta,” a move that is “not optional” under the current election law, the site notes.

“If we speak out, organize events, run ads or even put up billboards without registering, we risk prosecution. We know that because it’s already happened to us. But let’s be clear, we’re not doing this just to comply with bureaucrats. We’re doing it because we believe in this referendum.”

The rationale, according to the site: “More than 170,000 Albertans have already signed a petition to trigger a vote on independence. The referendum is set for October 19. That alone makes this one of the most important democratic moments in modern Canadian history. And yet, the very idea of Albertans voting on their future is already being attacked. That’s what makes this campaign necessary.”

For its part, ActForAlberta — which, as per the newly launched hub, is the working title for the Rebel-aligned third-party advertiser, although as of this writing, it does not yet appear to be listed on the Elections Alberta website, but will presumably pop up in the next few days when the paperwork goes through — “is going to campaign our way, with professional advertising, digital outreach and yes, our signature billboard truck,” the site vows.

“We’re going to make the case clearly, forcefully and without apology. Because the ‘no’ side will be massive. Governments, publicly funded groups, legacy media and political parties, including federal Conservatives, have already signalled their opposition. That’s exactly why this campaign matters. Albertans deserve to hear the case for independence, not just the arguments against it. They deserve a real debate, not one filtered through institutions that already have a stake in the outcome.”

A quick check of the ActForAlberta site reveals a newly launched crowdfunding campaign.

“If you support the idea of Rebel News registering as a third party campaign group, and believe that we should be allowed to make the case for Alberta, and fight back against the anti-Alberta regime, from Mark Carney to Naheed Nenshi to the Globe and Mail and the CBC, if you think Albertans need to hear the other side of the story, please help us,” it notes.

“If you do not qualify to donate to Act For Alberta, click here to donate to Rebel News to help them with their strong, independent, pro-Alberta journalism.”

According to the sidebar, contributors must be “individuals ordinarily resident in Alberta,” or, alternately, “a corporation carrying on business in Alberta that is not a prohibited corporation, an Alberta trade union or an Alberta employee organization.”

As of Wednesday morning, the donation bar showed six donors out of a goal of 1,000.

Back in Toronto, the newly reactivated ForCanada has hit the byelection hustings in University – Rosedale, which, as Toronto-based mission specialist David Menzies notes, is one of the three ridings up for grabs in the trio of midterm votes set for Apr. 13.

“This is a very big deal: should the Liberals win those byelections, Prime Minister Mark Carney will secure his coveted majority government,” he reminds his audience.

“And he will most certainly use that majority government to fast-track his mandate, which has less to do with economic development and more to do with censorship and control.”

To get a sense of how the race is playing out on the ground, Menzies “dropped by” the riding last week “to do exit interviews with those taking part in an advance poll,” accompanied by “our big, beautiful billboard truck to convey a simple message: Stop Carney,” which, under federal election rules, required Levant to once again register ForCanada as a federal third party advertiser, he explains.

“Given that this riding has long been a Liberal stronghold, it shouldn’t come as a big surprise that most people said they had indeed voted Liberal. When asked why, most simply said that they’ve ‘always voted Liberal,’ but did not provide any tangible reasons for being so loyal. Fascinating. Certainly, the most surreal answer to the question, ‘Why did you vote Liberal?’ was: ‘Why not?’”

The ForCanada truck also made the trek to Scarborough Southwest for an all-candidates’ debate hosted by two local food banks at the Birchcliff Bluffs United Church, which, as Menzies reports, was “a very civil affair,” albeit one in which “only the left-leaning voices were heard,” as several candidates were ‘MIA,’ including the one running under the Conservative banner, with “no explanation .. given,” according to Menzies.

As for the “big, beautiful billboard truck,” it “triggered a few residents, who said the right-of-centre messaging was ‘disturbing the neighbourhood.’ Of note: we were only broadcasting visual messages, not audio. Nevertheless, one furious resident vented his rage by incessantly honking the horn of his Ford F-150 pickup truck… thereby actually disturbing the neighbourhood!”

Menzies also found time to stake out a closed-to-media Liberal Party fundraiser at a Markham, Ont. golf club, which, in addition to featuring a headline appearance by the prime minister, was co-hosted by three Greater Toronto Area MPs — Public Safety Minister Gary Anandasangaree, Natural Resources Minister and “disgraced floor-crosser Michael Ma,” he noted.

“We had to confine our practice of journalism to the parking lot,” he explained.

“But that ‘tolerance’ eventually evaporated, and we were told by security guards to vamoose off the property or face trespassing charges! And get this: even a CTV cameraman was given the bum’s rush. Oh, the humanity! In any event, when scrumming the attendees at the fundraiser, so many said they loved Mark Carney… but they were unable to explain why.”

Meanwhile, Tamara Ugolini was in Indian River, Ont., as Conservative Leader Pierre Poilievre teamed up with local Conservative MP Philip Lawrence to “declare unequivocal opposition to the Liberal government’s proposed $90 billion Alto high-speed rail project” on a visit to a “generational cattle farm,” she explains.

“Poilievre pledged that a future Conservative government would cancel the project in favour of lowering taxes, reducing debt, and curbing inflation, while greenlighting self-funding private-sector projects instead.

“The press conference ultimately emphasized a clear Conservative message: prioritize fiscal responsibility, protect family farms and private property, and end costly Liberal megaprojects that deliver little for ordinary Canadians.”

Over at Juno News, the countdown was on to what Quinn Patrick notes would be the “first-ever live B.C. Conservative leadership debate,” which was organized by the Juno team and was scheduled to take place on Apr. 8., with federal Conservative MP Aaron Gunn and Juno contributor (and former B.C. Conservative staffer) Lindsay Shepherd as co-moderators.

Even so, as Juno correspondent Clayton DeMaine pointed out, two “high-profile” candidates, Peter Milobar and Caroline Elliott, have “signalled they would not attend” the debate, prompting former B.C. Conservative leader John Rustad to “blast the two no-shows” on X. “Leadership means showing up and doing the hard things,” Rustad opined in response to a media report on the event.

“It means answering the tough questions from the people you want to lead.”

In a post for The Counter Signal, DeMaine flagged newly minted New Democrat leader Avi Lewis’s comments to New Canadian Media, an “immigrant-centered advocacy group and news outlet,” in which Lewis “outlined his plan to open up the foreign worker program and increase the intake of refugee claimants,” he notes.

Elsewhere on the site, Cosmin Dzsurdzsa filed an update on a bid by the Sturgeon Lake Cree Nation to “shut down a massive citizen petition on Alberta independence,” as outlined in an application for an emergency injunction to “halt the campaign, claiming the push for separation is allegedly an ‘unconstitutional’ threat to Treaty rights.”

Trending on the progressive-left side of the Canadian activist mediaverse:

• The Breach podcast host Desmond Cole explores the case of Kumar Thuraisinkam, who “arrived to Canada in a ramshackle cargo ship in 2010, after a perilous, months-long journey across the Pacific Ocean, crammed alongside hundreds of Tamil refugees fleeing genocide in Sri Lanka,” and is now “facing deportation,” and how Public Safety Minister Gary Anandasangaree, who “who once decried the treatment of his community, isn’t stepping in to stop it.”
• Rabble reporter Gabriela Calugay-Casuga surveys labour leaders on “what they want to see from the NDP, the party traditionally seen as the party of the working class” in the wake of Lewis’s win.
• Canadian Dimension contributor Rob Goodman wonders whether Lewis “will … turn crisis into coherence” for the federal New Democrats.
• Rounding out the progressive-left roster, The Maple’s Alex Cosh digs into the numbers in a newly commissioned poll that found “a majority of Canadians (55 per cent) think it should be illegal for Canadian citizens to fight for the United States military,” while 54 per cent “agree with making it illegal for Canadian citizens to serve in Israel’s military.”