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Alberta

Elections Alberta ordered fines and prosecution in February. But authorities have not acted.

Charles Rusnell 2 Oct 2025The Tyee

Charles Rusnell is an independent investigative reporter based in Edmonton.

David Parker is supremely confident that he will never pay $112,500 in fines levied by Elections Alberta against himself and Take Back Alberta, the political activist organization he leads.

Nor does he think he will ever be prosecuted for failing to file third-party advertiser financial information to Elections Alberta.

“They haven’t contacted me in any way to try to get the money, which is interesting,” Parker said in a recent telephone interview.

Parker may have reason to be confident.

Recent inquiries by The Tyee found neither case against Parker and Take Back Alberta is currently being legally pursued, and there is confusion about whether the Alberta Crown Prosecution Service is even responsible for prosecuting the Elections Alberta case.

Elections Alberta levied the fines and sought the non-compliance prosecution in February for what it alleged were “numerous substantive breaches” of the Election Finances and Contributions Disclosure Act by Parker and Take Back Alberta ahead of the May 2023 provincial election.

The alleged breaches included failing to file financial reports, circumventing spending limits and accepting money from sources outside the province. Parker was personally fined $7,500 for allegedly twice knowingly providing false information in a report.

Parker refused to pay, as did Take Back Alberta, a registered third-party advertiser.

Under Alberta’s election law, registered third-party advertisers can support or oppose parties and candidates as long as they file financial reports to Elections Alberta, which Parker readily admits Take Bake Alberta did not do for several years.

“We haven’t been doing any political advertising,” said Parker. He has previously contended Take Bake Alberta was simply encouraging people to participate in the democratic process. He also has claimed Elections Alberta is attempting to infringe on his Charter right to political speech.

The fines were turned over for collection to Alberta Crown Debt Collections, which falls under the Treasury Board and Finance ministry.

The prosecution for failing to file financial information was — apparently — turned over by Elections Alberta to the Alberta Crown Prosecution Service.

Parker appealed the fines in March. But a check by The Tyee with Alberta Justice revealed no court time has been scheduled in 2025 for either the collections case or the prosecution.

“At this time, Alberta Crown Debt Collections cannot disclose actions taken on specific debtor files for legal purposes. We handle all accounts with the utmost professionalism, according to our privacy protection requirements,” the Treasury Board said in a statement.

When pressed, a Treasury Board spokeswoman said Alberta Crown Debt Collections is barred under the province’s privacy act, due to personal privacy, from commenting on a specific case.

“Also, public disclosure of individual enforcement actions could compromise legal proceedings and undermine our ability to negotiate and recover debts effectively.”

In an emailed statement, Elections Alberta said, “If the Election Commissioner consents to a prosecution (carried out by the Crown Prosecutor) that information is also posted on our website.”

“We have done this with respect to Take Back Alberta and their failure to comply with the direction of the Election Commissioner.”

But the Alberta Crown Prosecution Service, or ACPS, said it’s not their job to prosecute the election commissioner’s non-compliance case.

“If Mr. Parker were to be charged with an offence under the purview of the ACPS, then the ACPS would take conduct of the file and assess it to ensure it meets the standard for prosecution, as is done for all files. The ACPS does not lay charges.”

Presented with the statement from ACPS that they are not prosecuting the Parker case, a spokeswoman for Elections Alberta told The Tyee to seek further clarification from ACPS. The Crown prosecution service did not respond to an email asking if it had decided not to prosecute Parker.

Ties to Premier Smith

Parker is a personal friend of Alberta Premier Danielle Smith. She attended Parker’s wedding. In July, Smith and Justice Minister Mickey Amery attempted, but failed, to pressure Alberta’s chief electoral officer not to put a separation referendum question before the courts to determine if it contravenes Canada’s Constitution.

“To the best of our knowledge, Crown Debt Collections and Crown Prosecutions treat any matters we may refer to them as they would any other file they receive,” an Elections Alberta spokeswoman said in an email.

Elections Alberta doesn’t comment on investigations. But details of the case against Parker and Take Back Alberta were included in court documents first reported on by Matthew Black of Postmedia.

Parker believes the cases are being purposely stalled.

“They keep pushing it off because they know that I’m going to win,” Parker said.

“I have 400 witnesses, who are going to testify that it was not political advertising, and they’re fucked,” he said.

Parker said the charges were ridiculous. He referenced the allegation that Take Back Alberta accepted foreign funds as an example.

“If you look at the actual documentation, of the total $1.5 million or whatever that has been received, the foreign funds are about $8,000. They were from Cam Davies so that I could pay money owed to two single mothers for phone calling, which is not political advertising.”

Davies is a well-known, right-wing political organizer and campaign manager who lives in Red Deer. He is now president of the Republican Party of Alberta.

Parker said Davies mistakenly made the payment from a U.S. money account. He said there were three other small donations from Americans directly through the Take Back Alberta website, which were returned as soon as they were discovered.

“This is absolutely ridiculous, and I’m going to prove it, and I think they’re slowly beginning to realize that their little lawfare game isn’t going to work.”

If you have any information for this story, or information for another story, please contact Charles Rusnell in confidence via email.

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