Maverick Party, which pushed for Wexit and western autonomy, will not run in federal election
Party was deregistered after failing to provide financial returns
A Western Canada-based political party that looked to the Bloc Québécois for inspiration will not be running any candidates in this year's federal election.
On March 3, Elections Canada announced that the Maverick Party had been deregistered after failing to provide its annual financial transactions return and auditor's report.
Originally known as Wexit Canada (a portmanteau of "Western" and "Exit"), the party advocated for increased sovereignty for Canada's three territories and the provinces of British Columbia, Alberta, Saskatchewan and Manitoba. While that was envisioned as increased power and autonomy within Canada, full separation from Canada was also part of the movement.
In a statement, party leader Colin Krieger acknowledged the deregistration, writing that the party had been dealing with "a considerable amount of bureaucracy and red tape," which included difficulty finding registered auditors.
Krieger also said the political landscape in Canada had changed since its founding, and that he didn't see a way for the party's message to get out during the upcoming campaign.
A challenging election for smaller parties
Janet Brown of Janet Brown Opinion Research in Calgary said that, unlike the 2021 campaign, the 2025 election is shaping up to be a battle between the Liberals and Conservatives over a central question of who is better positioned to defend Canada against the threats posed to the country by U.S. President Donald Trump.
That, she said, left little room for smaller parties focused on more niche issues.
"In 2021, we were still very much in the middle of the pandemic," she said. "The issues that people were concerned about were quite complicated and diverse," including vaccines and public response to COVID-19.
As a result, she said, there were some vocal groups who felt the Conservatives weren't "right-wing enough," and looked to less mainstream parties to park their vote.
Among those groups was Wexit, a movement that began organizing at a grassroots level following the re-election of the Liberals under Justin Trudeau in 2019.
By 2020, it was registered with Elections Canada and taken over by interim leader Jay Hill, a former northern British Columbia MP who had entered politics as a member of the populist Reform Party in the 1980s and 90s and went on to be a government House leader under Conservative Prime Minister Stephen Harper.
Hill said that in retirement, he had become disillusioned with both the Conservative Party and the electoral system as a whole and that he had become a "reluctant separatist" as a result.
A push for western autonomy
"I came to the realization that our system of government just does not work for the West, will never work for the West," he told The Canadian Press in a 2021 interview.
He spoke approvingly of the Bloc Québécois strategy as a model for the Mavericks.
"Their strategy in Parliament is very simple. They take a look at a piece of legislation or a motion, and they determine it is good for Quebec. If it is, they vote for it, and if it isn't, they won't," Hill said at the time.
In the end, 29 candidates ran under the banner in the 2021 federal campaign, most in Alberta. None were elected, with individual candidates capturing around one to four per cent of the vote.
Speaking to CBC News Monday, Hill said news that the Maverick Party was not running was "disappointing" but agreed with the assessment that it was difficult for smaller parties to play a role in the current election.
Brown said since 2021, parties like Maverick and the People's Party have seen even less support as the 2025 campaign issues have come into view.
"It's a completely different landscape. It's about Trump. It's about tariffs. There's more of a mood in Canada to pull together," she said. "As a result, conservatives are in a mood where they have to pull together and vote Conservative. Progressives are of a mood where they have to come together and vote Liberal."
In his statement, Krieger said that while many of the Maverick Party's supporters have coalesced around the Conservatives, he still believes there will be a need for the movement in the future.
"If, as we suspect will happen, Poilievre fails Western Canada and starts to cater to eastern voters as a means of staying in power, then the Maverick message will need to be heard again," he wrote.
With files from The Canadian Press and Hanna Petersen