{"id":806925,"date":"2026-07-17T02:27:10","date_gmt":"2026-07-17T02:27:10","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/806925\/"},"modified":"2026-07-17T02:27:10","modified_gmt":"2026-07-17T02:27:10","slug":"alberta-ndp-leader-naheed-nenshi-says-hell-seek-calgary-seat-in-next-election","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/806925\/","title":{"rendered":"Alberta NDP Leader Naheed Nenshi says he’ll seek Calgary seat in next election"},"content":{"rendered":"

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Alberta NDP Leader Naheed Nenshi says he will seek a Calgary seat in next year’s general election.<\/p>\n

The former Calgary mayor made the announcement on social media Thursday afternoon, saying he was “forever grateful” to the constituents of Edmonton-Strathcona, a seat he won in a byelection<\/a> last year.<\/p>\n

“While I’ve been thrilled every day to serve as your MLA, I will be seeking election in a Calgary riding in the next general election,” he said.<\/p>\n

Nenshi was elected leader of the Alberta NDP<\/a> in 2024, succeeding Rachel Notley. He won the Edmonton-Strathcona seat in June 2025 after Notley stepped down as MLA<\/a> at the end of 2024.<\/p>\n

WATCH | Alberta’s NDP leader says referendum question is ‘garbage’:\"\"<\/p>\n

Why Alberta NDP leader says referendum question is ‘garbage’<\/p>\n

Premier Danielle Smith said on Friday that she wants Albertans to choose to stay in Canada, but Alberta NDP Leader Naheed Nenshi tells Power & Politics that if Smith were a true federalist she wouldn’t have called for a soft referendum later this year. He says the majority of Albertans will be ‘scared of losing our country’ in the months leading up to a vote where ‘no one wins.’<\/p>\n

He said he was making the announcement well in advance of next year’s election “so that the incredible constituency association in this riding has time for a healthy and robust nomination process to select a candidate and a future MLA worthy of representing you.”<\/p>\n

“As for me, I will seek election in a Calgary riding, to represent the communities in which I grew up and where I’ve made much of my professional and political life,” said Nenshi, who served three terms as Calgary’s mayor from 2010 to 2021.<\/p>\n

\"PeopleAlberta NDP Leader Naheed Nenshi takes photos with attendees during the Calgary Stampede parade on July 3, 2026. (Amir Said\/CBC)<\/p>\n

“I also don’t mind saying that to give Albertans the government they deserve, we need to win more seats in Calgary, and I’m happy to be part of that battle,” he said.<\/p>\n

Nenshi said he would announce which Calgary riding he’s running in after the completion of the electoral boundary redrawing process<\/a>, which he called “an illegitimate and corrupt process” in his statement.<\/p>\n

‘Not a surprise’: political scientist<\/p>\n

Lori Williams, a political science professor at Calgary\u2019s Mount Royal University,\u00a0said Nenshi’s decision to run in Calgary was “not a surprise.”<\/p>\n

“This is where his political roots are,” she said, adding that Nenshi’s decision also opens up a safe NDP seat in Edmonton.<\/p>\n

While it’s unclear which seat Nenshi would seek, Williams said it’s likely he would run for Calgary-Buffalo, held by longtime NDP MLA Joe Ceci. He won the seat with 63 per cent of the vote in the 2023 election.<\/p>\n

“From the time that we heard that Joe Ceci was not going to be running again, I think many people speculated that Nenshi would choose to run in the riding that he vacated, or some other Calgary riding,” Williams said.<\/p>\n

Nenshi said he will continue to serve the Edmonton-Strathcona constituency until the next election, which is scheduled for October 2027.<\/p>\n

Shortly after Nenshi’s announcement, former federal NDP candidate Trisha Estabrooks sent out an invitation to a “provincial political announcement” for Friday.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Listen to this article Estimated 3 minutes The audio version of this article is generated by AI-based technology.…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":806926,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[194293],"tags":[49,2798,48],"class_list":["post-806925","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-calgary","tag-ca","tag-calgary","tag-canada"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/806925","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=806925"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/806925\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/806926"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=806925"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=806925"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=806925"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}