CALGARY—Joe Anglin’s having a homecoming coming of sorts.

The former leader of the Alberta Greens and former Wildrose Party MLA announced Friday he would be running in Rimbey-Rocky Mountain House-Sundre as a candidate for the Alberta Party in the upcoming provincial election.

The announcement sets the stage for what could be a fierce rematch in the rural Alberta riding. Anglin lost the district in the 2015 election to incumbent, and now United Conservative Party Opposition house leader, Jason Nixon.

“For me, it’s a little bit like coming home. I actually helped start the Alberta Party back in 2008 when a small group of people had the party,” Anglin said in an interview with Star Calgary.

“The party went fairly left-wing on me somewhere around 2010, so I went with the Wildrose,” he said. “Now the party’s actually come back to a more fundamental or pragmatic stance, and I think that’s what this province needs.”

In October, Anglin teased he was considering another run for office as the first candidate for the fledgling Freedom Conservative Party of Alberta. The party was formed in 2018 by Derek Fildebrandt, the Independent MLA for Strathmore-Brooks, who was later named FCP leader.

Read more:

Former Wildrose MLA wants to run for the Freedom Conservative Party in 2019 election

‘This is insane’: Alberta MLA videotaped by United Conservative staff says he feels intimidated

Former United Conservative officer fined for illicit donation in ‘kamikaze’ campaign investigation

“While I still support any grassroots movement, Derek’s got a few years to go to build a party,” Anglin said of his decision to abandon the FCP. “It’s just that simple.”

Anglin, a former U.S. Marine, police officer, and Rimbey councillor, was first elected to the Alberta legislature in 2012 as a member of the Wildrose. He left the party two years later to sit as an Independent just weeks before then-party leader Danielle Smith and eight other MLAs famously crossed the floor to join the Progressive Conservative government.

He subsequently lost his seat in the 2015 provincial election, well behind Nixon, who captured 40 per cent of the vote compared to Anglin’s 11 per cent.

The loss came months after Anglin accused Wildrose executives of skewing nomination rules to favour preferred candidates and the party quashed his bid to disqualify Nixon from running as the nominee in the riding.

“If the Wildrose can’t follow their own rules, I’m not sure they’re fit to govern,” Anglin told the Calgary Herald at the time.

He left the party four months later.

Anglin has kept busy since losing his seat four years ago, studying law through a U.S. university, where he recently received his juris doctorate.

“I actually just took the bar in California, and I’ll find out how I did in May,” he said. “I will eventually take the bar up here. I’m in no rush to continue studies at the moment.”

For now, he has trained his sights on unseating Nixon, defeating the UCP, and providing a “pragmatic” voice in the legislature.

Anglin said the UCP is unfit to govern the province, pointing to controversies that have plagued the party in recent weeks.

Earlier this week, the party removed its Calgary-Beddington candidate, Randy Kerr, because he wasn’t “forthright in responding to the party’s inquiries regarding his financial contribution to the Jeff Callaway leadership campaign.”

Alberta’s election commissioner has been investigating Callaway’s failed leadership bid, which has been accused of being a “kamikaze mission” to attack Brian Jean, now-UCP Leader Jason Kenney’s biggest challenger in the 2017 race.

The commissioner recently fined two of Callaway’s donors, one for contributing money that wasn’t hers, the other for obstructing an investigation.

Loading... Loading... Loading... Loading... Loading... Loading...

The UCP was heavily criticized after party staffers recorded Independent MLA Prab Gill and a high-ranking NDP official shortly before the pair met to discuss a constituency matter. The video clip was edited to appear as black-and-white security camera footage and posted on Twitter — a move Nixon defended.

“The whole issue with Nixon justifying the filming of Prab Gill, that to me is just ridiculous,” said Anglin.

“Running (suspicious) campaigns and harassing sitting MLAs. That’s not what the public needs to deal with the current problems of this province.”

Read more about: