Danielle Smith: How does a divisive candidate become a unifying premier in Alberta?

This column is an opinion from Graham Thomson, an award-winning journalist who has covered Alberta politics for more than 30 years. For more information about CBC's Opinion section, please see the FAQ.

From political pariah to premier — Danielle Smith's political comeback is one for the ages.

Smith, who once called herself "unelectable" is the new leader of the United Conservative Party after winning Thursday night's leadership race. In the next few days, she will be sworn in as Alberta's new premier.

But she will be a premier with more political baggage than Air Canada's lost and found.

Smith won by motivating a base of disgruntled Albertans who thought pandemic restrictions unnecessary, cheered on angry truckers' blockades, and believe Prime Minister Justin Trudeau is out to destroy the province's energy industry.

It was a campaign of anger, grievance, conspiracies and retribution — and her supporters loved it. 

She promised to fire the board of Alberta Health Services, get rid of "socialist" public servants and, most notably, introduce an Alberta Sovereignty Act that she says would allow Alberta to ignore federal laws and court decisions deemed to be un-Albertan.

The party says 82,000 mail-in and in-person votes were cast. About 124,000 members were eligible to vote.

Smith didn't win a landslide: just 42,423 votes. In second place, Travis Toews with 36,480. But it was more than enough.

What Albertans will need to get their heads around is that Jason Kenney, who led the UCP to victory in 2019 with more than one million votes, has been replaced by someone whose supporters couldn't fill Edmonton's Commonwealth Stadium.

And as far as she is concerned, that's enough of a mandate to invoke sweeping changes to Alberta laws and how Albertans are governed.

This race was never about winning lots of votes but winning enough votes from UCP members. 

Unlike other candidates in the race, who tried to present themselves as palatable to a wide range of Albertans, Smith focused on the same angry Albertans who helped undermine Kenney in his leadership review in May.

But Smith cannot use the same strategy to unite the deeply divided UCP or to win over Albertans, many of whom, according to public opinion polls, simply don't like her.