Albertans have opted to remain part of Canada — decisively voting to reject the idea of holding a formal referendum on separatism.

Elections Alberta began releasing the results of the province’s referendum on the topic late Monday night, with around 76 per cent of Albertans voting to remain part of Canada without any further deliberation.

The separatism question asked voters if Alberta should remain in Canada or if the provincial government should begin the legal process of holding a future binding referendum on whether or not Alberta should separate from Canada.

At watch parties, pro-Canada supporters cheered as independence proponents were somber — but resolute.

“Don’t mess with Canada!” Thomas Lukaszuk, former deputy premier and organizer of the pro-Canada forces, said to cheers at a watch party at the Polish Hall in central Edmonton.

Lukaszuk launched the Forever Canadian movement that collected more than 400,000 signatures from Albertans who agreed the province should remain in Canada.

“I think it’s a very strong signal to the rest of Canada and frankly, to the world, that Alberta is united — that this country cannot be broken up,” he said to Global News on Monday night as results began to be released. “It’s a message to the United States saying, ‘back off, you can’t break up Canada. We are as solid as solid gets.’”

Monday’s results mirror more than half a year of polling, which since the beginning of 2026, has consistently shown about 70 per cent of Albertans want the province to remain in Canada.

In January, an Ipsos poll found about three in 10 residents supported independence, but a deeper dive revealed that when faced with the costs and consequences, only half of those interested in separatism were truly committed to following through.

Lukaszuk’s citizen initiative petition did not call for a referendum but instead wanted MLAs in the Alberta Legislature to vote on the issue — which he maintains is what should have happened.

“We just spent $130 million in our referendum, plus additional dollars, that will add up for nothing. We knew that this was the answer. (Premier Danielle Smith) could have called a vote in the Legislature and spared us a lot of division, a lot of expenses.”

The referendum drew international attention — and not for good reason, he said.

“They’re wondering what’s happening in Canada. Are we a safe investment environment? Is this a country that could potentially split and become unstable?” he said.

About eight blocks away, a rally for separatists at a restaurant turned quiet as the numbers rolled in.

“Our movement isn’t going anywhere,” said Jeffrey Rath, prominent conservative politics activist and co-founder of the Alberta Prosperity Project.

“We’ve dominated the conversation in the last year. We’ve been educating Albertans on the benefits of independence, and we’re going to continue moving forward.”

Rath shrugged off the early results, saying in his view it’s still important to recognize the hundreds of thousands of people who voted to leave Canada.

“We’re absolutely thrilled with the work that we’ve done and the fact that we’ve created a political movement that’s going to go forward from here,” he said.

Grievances in Alberta towards the federal government are not new.

The nuanced disgruntlement harkens back decades: Alberta farmers feeling shortchanged by the monopoly the Canadian Wheat Board had over crop prices and their sales, anger over how Pierre Trudeau’s National Energy Program decimated jobs and investment in the province’s oil and gas sector in the 1980s, and more recent grievances over the Justin Trudeau government’s policies on energy investment and public health restrictions during the COVID-19 pandemic.

“We’re sick and tired of being regulated by Ottawa,” Rath said.

Four years ago, Alberta separatists worked to oust former premier Jason Kenney and get Smith elected leader of the UCP — and Rath has been vocal about his desire to now get rid of her too.

“Moving forward from here, our hundreds of thousands of members and volunteers are going to be committed to taking back ownership of the (UCP),” he said.

Rath is pushing for a special general meeting to discuss whether Smith still has the confidence of the party’s base.

Smith, who said she voted to stay in Canada, promised a simple 50 per cent plus one majority would carry the day and that there would be no followup referendum for the rest of her UCP government’s mandate.

“Thank you, Alberta!” Smith wrote in a statement on social media, responding to the results.

“I’m very pleased to see the initial results from Elections Alberta show widespread support for remaining in Canada. Albertans have voted for a stronger Alberta in a united Canada.”

Smith’s United Conservative Party never campaigned on holding a separation vote in the 2023 provincial election, but this year Smith said some Albertans’ anger with the state of affairs under former Liberal prime minister Justin Trudeau boiled over into hundreds of thousands signing petitions for and against Confederation.

She said a referendum was necessary to resolve the matter once and for all, adding repeatedly  if the vote went the way polling has suggested for months, she expected everyone to accept it and move on.

Smith said she would give an address on Tuesday at 6:45 p.m. to detail where the province goes from here.

Alberta Opposition NDP Leader Naheed Nenshi’s reaction to the results was short and simple.

“Thank you! We saved Canada. Now, we save Alberta,” he posted to his social media.

The balloting completes a winding process that began in May, when Smith called the referendum.

Debate turned some neighbours against neighbours. It disrupted public events.

The Alberta flag morphed into a disputed de facto banner for those who want to separate.

There were rallies and speeches, sign wars, stacks of policy documents, analyses and warnings of economic apocalypse should Alberta try to go its own way.

Prime Minister Mark Carney said Albertans choose to build a stronger Canada.

“They chose unity, to build together, and to take care of each other,” he said in a statement.

He added the results on the defining question of separation mean that Albertans and all Canadians will move forward together with “renewed purpose and high ambition.”

“Canada is so much greater than the sum of its parts. Now it is our opportunity to take all that we have been given as Canadians – and we have been given the greatest country in the world – and make our country better for all of us.”

By law, officials must count all votes by hand within 48 hours. Question 10 — about separation — was counted first.

Early results were supposed to start being released at 8 p.m. MT — once the final ballot was cast and all polling stations closed — but several locations opened late, pushing back that timeline by more than three hours.

The referendum asked residents 10 government-initiated questions, though public and political attention largely focused on the question asking Albertans whether they want to remain in Canada or proceed with a binding referendum on leaving Confederation.

The referendum, announced Feb. 19, initially included nine questions pertaining to immigration and the Constitution. The question on independence, added back in May by Smith, is the tenth that voters were asked to mark an X on.

The separation question was added after Smith said she disagreed with the ruling of a Court of King’s Bench judge that quashed a separatist petition in May, saying the provincial government had a duty to consult with First Nations before Stay Free Alberta was allowed to gather signatures.

She said because the proposed referendum would not “directly trigger separation,” the court ruling would not apply.

Interest in the outcome of the referendum was high even before Monday’s official voting day.

More than 1.35 million votes were cast in both last week’s advance polls and by special mail-in ballots — a significant increase over the roughly 810,000 who voted that way in the 2023 provincial election.

The use of special ballots increased tenfold in the referendum compared to that election, with a total of 519,082 mail-in ballots received by Elections Alberta by the cut-off date.

The remaining nine questions in the referendum surround immigration and constitutional issues.

The immigration questions ask Albertans whether the province should have more say over who comes to the province to work and whether it’s time to put more limitations — and potentially introduce fees — on some who arrive seeking health care and education.

The constitutional questions ask Albertans to bless talks with other provinces to wrest power from the federal government and abolish the Senate.

Smith, who for years has said she supports a “sovereign Alberta within a united Canada,” said the first nine questions are meant to give the province leverage in negotiations with Ottawa.

She said needs a yes on the remaining nine questions to get a mandate to bargain for a better deal with Carney.

Carney came to Alberta last week to rally pro-Canada forces and to agree to disagree with Smith. He urged Albertans to reject the nine remaining questions.

Elections Alberta hired more than 48,000 workers to count ballots, which is happening around the clock.

The results of those nine questions should be completed and announced by Wednesday. Officials will count ballots in order from question one to nine. Timelines depend on location closing times and voter turnout.

With files from Jack Farrell, The Canadian Press