Elections Alberta is one step closer to providing the unofficial results of Monday’s referendum, having finished late Thursday evening counting the 519,000 special ballots that were cast via mail. However, the agency is not estimating when it will be able to deliver the unofficial results of the referendum. At 11 a.m. Friday, the agency and its workers entered hour 85 of counting voting day ballots, work that could not be started until the final polling station closed Monday at 10:59 p.m. MT. Question 10, about the province separating from Canada, was being prioritized, but 16 polls in two northern districts were not yet reporting. According to the early counts, voters supported remaining a part of Canada three to one. The majority of Albertans supported their government making changes to immigration but did not support their government pushing for constitutional change on several issues. Overall, 99 per cent of polls were reporting. Background The special and advance ballot counts began at 5 p.m. on Monday. The unofficial total of people who cast votes during the advance voting period is nearly 838,800, bringing the total number of people who had already voted when referendum day arrived to 1.35 million, or 43.1 per cent of eligible voters. According to provincial legislation, unofficial results of referendums with seven or more questions should be delivered within 48 hours. Although Elections Alberta initially said it was up to the task and sought 60,000 workers, it has since called the job impossible with 10 questions posed to voters and a realized taskforce of 47,000. It has not confirmed how many workers are counting ballots. The total number of ballots cast in Alberta’s referendum sat at 20.4 million Friday morning. The final number of ballots cast in the 2025 federal election was 19.8 million, for which Elections Alberta said some 200,000 workers were hired across the country. While legislation dictates a deadline for Elections Alberta to deliver referendum results, it does not spell out a consequence for failing to do so. However, the chief electoral officer is accountable to the legislative assembly, the government says.
