Alberta’s new man in Washington, D.C., is Nathan Cooper, the 44-year-old former MLA from the rural heartland of the province. Nathan just wrapped up six years as Speaker of the Alberta legislature, an all-around nice fellow credited with keeping partisan shenanigans in the legislature to a minimum.
Ontario, Quebec and Alberta are the only provinces with full-time boots on the ground in D.C.; Alberta has a total of 11 staff in four offices across America, Nathan reports. “To put that in perspective,” he adds, “Quebec has close to 100 full-time people trying to defend the interests of Quebec in the U.S.”
I’m curious: What would entice Nathan to quit a plum job — refereeing partisan debates under the dome in Edmonton — and move to D.C. as a diplomat, a place where it’s a struggle for anyone to be heard above the cacophony of lobbyists and legislators?
More importantly, will his presence matter one whit, should Mark Carney, Canada’s new prime minister and man of the moment in Kananaskis Country, make it clear he speaks for Canada, full stop?
Alberta needs someone in D.C. “who can tell our story,” Nathan pitches. It’s a glib answer to my question, but he qualifies his response; he knows he needs to convince not just the pro-energy crowd in the U.S. of the merits of Alberta as a trading partner, but the skeptics too. “It’s very possible,” he observes, “the House and the Senate will be different after the (American) midterms.”
“And, I think the Speaker’s role, in many respects, prepared me for that,” he explains, “because at the end of the day, you need to be able to garner the trust and respect of both sides of the House, or you end up in a very unruly place.”
Nathan replaces former MP James Rajotte as Alberta’s representative in Washington, and when we chat, he’s been in the new job for less than two weeks. Cellphone in hand and safely parked on the side of the road, he’s enroute to G7 briefing meetings in Calgary. A full 20 minutes into our conversation, he relaxes a little, unbuckles his seatbelt and takes a few sips of his Tim Horton’s coffee.
“What a rocket ride,” he says with a nervous laugh, and describes his first week in D.C., alongside Premier Danielle Smith: meeting U.S. senators and congresspeople, as well as Canadian and American energy producers. After the G7, where the hosting province enjoys certain privileges including “grip and grins” with world leaders, there’s the Calgary Stampede in early July, a shindig that attracts politicos from across the world.
By August, Nathan plans to have his family settled in D.C. and he’ll be working from an office lodged within the Canadian Embassy. “Alberta and Ontario are still inside the embassy,” he explains, “while the province of Quebec has their own office space and functions independent of the embassy.”
I can’t help but wonder: Isn’t it confusing, operating under one embassy roof, with the Albertans cozying up to Americans (for example, allowing U.S. liquor back on shelves) while other provinces threaten retaliation against Trump’s latest tariff hikes for steel and aluminum?
And worse, isn’t there a risk that provincial representation in D.C. is proof — to those who care about these things — there is no unified Team Canada position that even the prime minister can wrangle?
“The (Canadian) embassy is pretty good to us,” Nathan answers, thoughtfully, “and I think we’re pretty fair with the embassy. On most things we’re ‘Team Canada.’” But, he acknowledges, “there are some issues, around energy and resource development, where we have a different view of the world.
“The good news,” he adds, “is most people don’t know — even (American) legislators — what we’re doing on a province-to-province basis, whether or not we’re retaliating, whether we are in lockstep with the federal government.
“Things are so chaotic there,” Nathan reflects, that even the Americans “don’t pretend to know what the Trump administration is going to do.” Everyone, he says, accepts that every situation is fluid and dynamic: “That’s the default position of everyone right now in D.C.”
Nathan represented the rural constituency of Olds-Didsbury-Three Hills for a decade; his exit from partisan politics triggered a byelection to be held later this month. One of the candidates in the race is Cameron Davies, leader of the Alberta Republican Party; it openly advocates for Alberta’s secession from Canada.
Many of his former constituents are frustrated, Nathan admits, “they want to consider separation, but at the end of the day, the overwhelming majority of those people just want Canada to work and Alberta to have a strong role similar to the role that Quebec plays in Confederation.” That’s a part of the Alberta story he may need to explain more fully to people in D.C.
Nathan’s certainly not agitating for Alberta to become America’s 51st state, but he is paying close attention to Carney’s nation-building efforts. “If there’s no pipeline with hydrocarbons in it, be it gas or oil, in the approved list of (nation-building) projects,” he cautions, “that will have significant impact on how Albertans feel about national unity.”
Americans, too, are watching Canada’s new prime minister, and see him clearly as the guy in charge of negotiating a new bilateral economic and security pact with Trump, Nathan says. But some are asking: “Which Carney is going to govern: the climate change advocate or the world banker?”
It’s a fair question.
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