John Bolton - Independence Calendar Episode #9 - February 1st, 2026

00:00:00.000 Hi, it's John, and welcome to the Independence Calendar for Sunday, February the 1st. This

00:00:07.640 is Episode 9, and boy, have we ever got a great Independence Calendar for you this week. I want

00:00:14.000 to get right into it because there's so much stuff to go through. So what are we going to

00:00:18.380 talk about this week? We'll talk a little bit about the Big Four, the big event here in Calgary

00:00:23.020 on Monday night. How and where to sign a petition has just gotten so much easier, and my God,

00:00:29.800 there are so many places to sign petitions. We'll get into that in just a moment. Also,

00:00:35.400 I want to talk a little bit about the backlash, the way people are talking about people in the

00:00:40.960 independence movement from Alberta and outside the province, our response to the insults. That's

00:00:47.020 coming up. It's the only thing I want to focus on that might be considered a little negative

00:00:51.020 because there's a lot positive going on. Also, I'm going to talk a little bit about the people

00:00:55.820 who live outside the province who want to help out with the independence movement. I have got some

00:01:01.300 amazing submissions for you. 27 of them this week. Keep them coming. JohnBoltonAB at gmail.com. Videos,

00:01:10.320 pictures, flags, banners, anything to do with Alberta independence. They're terrific this week as well.

00:01:16.640 Also, I've got an interview with Mitch Sylvester from Stay Free Alberta. I spoke to him right after the

00:01:21.640 big event last Monday night at the Big Four here in Calgary. Watch until the end because Alberta

00:01:28.600 independence has gone global. You're going to love how I'm ending the video today. It's just

00:01:35.300 terrific, so stay tuned for that. The Big Four, I was there on Monday night, and it was a great

00:01:39.800 honor to be there with 4,000 to 5,000 people. Just a few of the pictures that I took from the Big Four

00:01:46.020 on Monday night. Jeff Rath was speaking. Mitch Sylvester, of course. Eva Chipiak will feature

00:01:51.760 a little bit of a video from Eva in just a couple of minutes. She was wonderful as well. And a big

00:01:57.020 shout out to Derek Smith from Unacceptable Fringe, who was the emcee for the event. All of these people

00:02:03.380 really enjoyed their evening, and I had a chance to talk to so many of you at the Big Four here in

00:02:09.060 Calgary. People asked me my favorite part of the event, and it was talking to literally hundreds

00:02:13.840 of people and shaking your hand, so thanks very much for that. Now, in recent weeks, the calendar

00:02:19.860 has been about telling you where events are, and just recently has become more about telling you where

00:02:25.720 petitions are. I received more email in this past week than probably the previous weeks combined,

00:02:32.080 so at johnboltonabgmail.com. Lots of email coming out. Fewer people asking about petition signing

00:02:38.300 locations, and that's really good news. There's so many out there right now, but if you're trying

00:02:42.180 to find one, it's gotten easier, all right? It's real easy now. Let's go over to stayfreealberta.com.

00:02:47.780 That's where to find out all the information you need to know. You can become a canvasser. I am one.

00:02:52.820 I'll tell you about how I might be getting an event here in Southeast Calgary together real soon.

00:02:59.160 Also, you can donate more on that in just a moment, and you can request to sign the petition,

00:03:03.620 but now you've got this easy way to find signing locations, because now you can search by

00:03:09.060 municipality. For instance, if we want to find Fort, we put in there. We get Fort McLeod. We get Fort

00:03:14.580 McMurray. We get Fort Saskatchewan. How about Bicycle? There's one happening in Bicycle as well.

00:03:20.500 How about Edmonton? And there are a bunch of signing places in Edmonton, and if you go back to the very

00:03:25.820 beginning, you'll see that all of these places are petition signing places. Now, it's really quite

00:03:31.440 extraordinary, and of course, absolutely impossible. Let me scroll through these. Impossible to get to

00:03:36.860 all of them on the calendar. So, go to stayfreealberta.com and find out where these are

00:03:42.860 happening, and you can get all your information there. So, I don't want to be negative here on

00:03:50.000 the calendar, but I want to address something that has become more prevalent this week. If you're part of

00:03:54.760 the independence movement, you may have been hearing these things. If you're on social media,

00:03:58.100 I would suggest you stay off of it. It's a sewer, okay? But I don't go there very often,

00:04:05.500 but you're probably getting or seeing the same thing I'm seeing. Earlier this week, David Eby,

00:04:10.100 B.C. Premier, said that the leaders of the independence movement here in Alberta are

00:04:14.080 traders, and that everybody jumped on board, and they've been piling on. And they're calling

00:04:18.380 anybody who wants Alberta independence a trader these days.

00:04:22.660 At the event on Monday night at the Big Four, everybody was great, but I really enjoyed Eva

00:04:31.240 Chipiak's speech, and I'd heard Eva's speech before. She got a standing ovation, and it was at the event

00:04:37.960 that happened on January the 10th at the Queensland Community Center here in Southeast Calgary.

00:04:43.580 I was the emcee of the event. Corey Morgan was there as well from the Western Standard.

00:04:48.320 Dennis Kalma, who wrote The Value of Freedom, he was there as well, and Eva spoke. She was

00:04:53.620 outstanding, and she addressed this issue. So a very short segment from Eva from January the 10th.

00:05:00.540 Enough with the games. We are tired of being told to sit down and shut up. We are done with that.

00:05:06.860 Self-determination is not radical. Democratic participation is not dangerous.

00:05:11.620 Asking a question is not treason. An informed, engaged citizenry is not a threat to democracy.

00:05:18.820 It is proof that democracy is still alive.

00:05:27.360 Eva Chipiak is terrific. Again, she got a standing ovation that night at the Queensland Community

00:05:32.400 Center when she said that. I'm working on getting her here for an interview on the channel, but she is

00:05:37.280 very busy. And certainly, I will feature a segment on an upcoming independence calendar if I get to

00:05:43.580 talk to her. But if somebody comes up to you and starts yelling at you or is mad at you, just turn

00:05:48.100 around and walk away. They're really not worth our time. And you're not a traitor. All you want is

00:05:53.480 something better for your family and for your province, soon-to-be country of Alberta. Now, I do get a lot of

00:05:59.480 email in with questions. I try to read them as much as possible. I got this one in. I wanted to

00:06:04.120 address this from Mark, who lives in BC. He says he's got an Alberta birth certificate. He worked in

00:06:10.060 Alberta for his whole career. And he had a question for me. My question to you is, how can I be involved

00:06:15.420 in the independence movement? And he says, bottom line, it's been a dream of mine to see Alberta

00:06:20.560 independence. And should that occur, I will be putting a for sale sign up immediately and moving back

00:06:25.460 home to Alberta. But if you live in Alberta, and your residence is in Alberta, you can't sign a

00:06:30.440 petition and you won't be able to vote in a referendum. How can you help? I got back to Mark

00:06:35.980 and I said, if you live in BC, you can't sign the petition, but you can donate to the cause.

00:06:41.820 They really need money to promote the signature campaign moving forward and promote the referendum.

00:06:46.780 If you have the means, go to stayfreealberta.com and make a donation. So they do need some money.

00:06:51.980 If you can make a donation, if you have the means, please do that as well.

00:06:55.460 One other thing before I get to the viewer submissions this week, I got an email in,

00:07:00.760 johnboltonab at gmail.com from Austin, who lives near me. It says, hi, John, I was wanting to throw

00:07:06.560 an idea out there to you. I am in New Brighton, which is not too far from where I live here in

00:07:10.940 South East Calgary. I am a canvasser as well. Would you want to set up together and possibly with

00:07:16.540 other canvassers to take signatures in the McKenzie Town, Prestwick, Copperfield, New Brighton area?

00:07:21.580 Let me know your thoughts. And I said, you're darn right I want to do this.

00:07:26.240 Dennis Kalma, who was at the event at the Queensland Community Centre on the 10th with me,

00:07:30.520 he's a canvasser as well. He said he'd be happy to go out and do something like this.

00:07:34.880 I'm working on something like this in South East Calgary. I think I want to get the town hall we have

00:07:39.880 here in McKenzie Town, where I live, and set up some tables so people can sign petitions.

00:07:44.560 If you live in the area and want to be part of this, send me an email, johnboltonab at gmail.com,

00:07:51.560 put as the title, I want to help. I want to help so I find it quickly. And then what I want to do is

00:07:58.720 maybe have everybody pitch in a couple of bucks because it does cost some money to rent the room

00:08:03.180 for the day. And I don't want to incur all of that cost myself. Austin said, be happy to pitch in some

00:08:09.640 money and it would only be a very small amount. So if you want to want to be part of that, get in

00:08:14.480 touch with me and we can all sit down and have a petition signing right down here in South East

00:08:18.900 Calgary. I want to help do that. That would be terrific. Now let's check out your viewer submissions

00:08:25.100 this week. They're absolutely amazing. Keep them coming. A long list today, but look for yours. And if

00:08:31.820 you have any great pictures, you have any great videos, you have anything to do with Alberta

00:08:36.400 independence, get in touch. So let's check them out for this week. This is my favorite part of the

00:08:48.440 calendar where I get to look at the stuff that you sent me and boy, did I get a lot of stuff this

00:08:53.180 week. Keep them coming. I got 27 to go through here. So let's get to them and not waste any more

00:09:00.120 time. Let's start off with Louise. Louise with her, we're done. Alberta first flags. Louise,

00:09:05.840 I just like to say, I read your message. I am sorry for your loss. Thank you for fighting hard

00:09:10.460 for the independence movement. Your husband would be proud. Donald here with a beautiful Alberta flag

00:09:16.520 on his house. Thank you very much, Donald. Three pictures from Neil with an Alberta t-shirt that he

00:09:22.040 got from the unacceptable fringe. Also with his ranch decked out in Alberta blue and with, this is pretty

00:09:29.280 cool, the Republic of Alberta passport. Thanks to River's Edge 3008, sent a good one in last week.

00:09:36.320 Here's a petition signing lineup in Grand Prairie. Thanks River. Keep them coming. Looks like a great

00:09:41.340 turnout there, just like it has been all over the province. Chris with his sign in Spruce Grove at a

00:09:47.380 petition signing, which was very busy. And he's been handing out these as well. Great job to Chris.

00:09:53.320 Thanks for working hard for the movement. Cheryl and her Faith, Family and Freedom shirt. Out getting 0.89

00:10:00.320 some exercise. Well done to Cheryl here. We've got Jocelyn's flag. She's a regional leader in Edmonton. 0.65

00:10:06.140 Thank you so much, Jocelyn, for your submission. A couple here from Dawn. Dawn in Edmonton with a

00:10:11.860 sovereignty banner in Ottawa. Check out this video. This is terrific.

00:10:15.660 What do you guys think about Alberta leaving Canada? Got any thoughts on that?

00:10:23.000 I'll be okay. And I'd move to Alberta. All right. That's what we want to hear, buddy. Right on. Thank

00:10:28.400 you very much. People must have been wondering what the hell was going on when they saw that sign on

00:10:33.000 the fence there in Ottawa. Thanks, Dawn, for that. That's terrific. Thanks for this one as well. The

00:10:37.400 Alberta banner under the Welcome to Alberta sign. Terrific. And some stickers as well. Dawn,

00:10:44.140 thanks for all the stuff you sent. I'll look for more in the future. Paul in his Alberta

00:10:48.660 independence truck in Edmonton. It was nice meeting you at the Big Four on Monday night. I'd had such a

00:10:54.380 great time meeting all the nice people. Christian and his flags. One's Alberta and the other one says

00:10:59.040 F. I think it says Trudeau. So Christian, you need to update your flag to say Kearney, but thanks for

00:11:06.140 sending that. Rosalie in Biceker. She was in Biceker on January the 8th. They had seating for 300

00:11:12.360 and she estimated 100 people were standing. So a very successful event there. Dennis in Medicine

00:11:18.900 Hat. Check this out. Looks like grain elevators here. A couple of pics from that. Thanks for

00:11:22.440 putting the sign up on the grain elevators. Mark from his mobile signing station. He says he's

00:11:28.160 originally from Ontario. You know, Mark, I'm from Ontario as well. I've never heard it called that

00:11:33.160 before, but I will use that in the future. And here is Al Burton, the most Albertan man. I was talking

00:11:39.520 to him at the Big Four. Here he is with me and Derek from Unacceptable Fringe. Great picture.

00:11:45.660 Great to talk to you, Al. And I hope to have you on the channel soon. Moshe had a Medicine Hat 0.71

00:11:50.700 signing. Three different pics for you here. And like everywhere across the province, these things

00:11:55.520 are so successful. I featured James with his Alberta tattoo last week on the channel, which I thought was

00:12:01.760 really going above and beyond. But check out the video here, James. Thanks for sending that in. I do

00:12:06.660 appreciate it. We also got this from Chris and Dawn with Alberta Sovereignty Now pics. Three different

00:12:13.420 pics. If you have a picture outside your house or anywhere on your property or you're putting them

00:12:18.040 up anywhere, you've got anything that's got the Alberta flag on it, I'd love to see them send them

00:12:23.020 to the channel. And Evan with a pic from the Big Four. Everybody had a lot of fun there. Thanks to Evan

00:12:29.140 for your picture. This is me and Jack at the Big Four. Thanks. Shelly probably took the picture. It was nice

00:12:35.200 meeting you as well, Jack. Here's Lee who sent in these three pictures as well, fighting hard for the

00:12:41.240 Alberta independence movement. Russ at the Big Four as well with the Alberta Republic t-shirt. Thanks a lot for

00:12:47.500 that, Russ. And Dallas with his Alberta prosperity banner. I hope I didn't go through those too quickly. But

00:12:54.240 thanks for everything you sent in to me. I do appreciate it. And if I didn't get to your picture, I might have

00:13:01.780 missed it. So if I missed it this week, send it to me again and I'll try to get it on next week. And

00:13:06.420 remember, I can't respond to all of your messages. I try to read them all. And generally, if I do get

00:13:11.820 back to you, they're very short messages because I got more than 200 email in this last week alone.

00:13:17.620 John Bolton, ab at gmail.com is the place to send your stuff. Now let's hear from Mitch Sylvester. He's

00:13:23.780 the reason why we have the petition signing campaign right now from Stay Free Alberta. I spoke to him

00:13:29.900 right after the big event last Monday at the Big Four here in Calgary.

00:13:34.660 And the big event is over tonight here at the Big Four. And I think we're going to end it with the

00:13:40.000 big guy. Mitch Sylvester is with us from Stay Free Alberta. Mitch, this is a remarkable place to come.

00:13:48.220 I've never been in this building before. It was a remarkable evening, packed all the way, all of the

00:13:53.880 seats. Let me just turn around here. All of these seats were full and there's the same amount of

00:13:59.300 seats at the other end of this building. Your thoughts on what happened tonight?

00:14:03.660 Well, I was expecting this, honestly. With all the momentum we've had, I thought that we would fill

00:14:08.980 the room. I was actually concerned that the room wasn't big enough. Honest to God, I'm not even

00:14:13.080 kidding. Right. So, you know what? We talked about it. The fire marshals warned us they weren't going to

00:14:18.760 let so many people in the room. And I believe that's what happened. We turned people away.

00:14:22.400 Yeah. Earlier today, around 11 o'clock, I was seeing pictures show up on X of the lineup

00:14:28.200 outside to sign the petition. And I was here. And I was sitting at my house and I thought,

00:14:32.900 I got to go down there. And I got in my car. I got here about two o'clock and people were still

00:14:37.620 coming in. And I heard that there were something like 800 or more people that went through in just

00:14:41.540 a little over an hour. And it was steady all day long. The petition campaign, you know, I was part

00:14:46.600 of an event on January 10th and that was the night we started seeing pictures of lineups. And it's been

00:14:50.580 like that every night since then. You've got to be just thrilled the way things are going.

00:14:55.280 Well, you know, it's kind of a surprise. I thought we would have to work harder than this,

00:14:59.340 but it's a really good problem. I'm really, really happy that people are coming. And so we're just

00:15:03.800 going to try and get in front of them and give them places to sign. And you know what? We've got

00:15:08.360 3,000 campuses ready to go now, so we can absolutely get that moving. And you know what? We're just

00:15:13.280 going to give everybody the opportunity to sign and help us out and become a free and independent

00:15:16.960 country. I got my badge. Good. I applied for it back on January 4th. It took almost three weeks to come

00:15:22.600 to my house. So there's still some people out there waiting for them right now. I'm hoping

00:15:25.700 to have a signing event in my community. Dennis Kalmas said he might come down and help out.

00:15:30.080 We've got other people who want to go down there and we're going to set up a big area

00:15:33.520 down in Southeast Calgary to do this. Okay.

00:15:37.660 Well, how are you feeling? I mean, I feel good. I'm really happy about this. You know,

00:15:42.240 an event like this of this magnitude is stressful. And you know, at 630 when the rooms were filling

00:15:49.260 up and you know, it makes it all worthwhile. And then we get the opportunity to grow what we do

00:15:54.420 here by actually asking people to, you know, take action and help us out and help themselves out

00:16:00.180 basically. And you know what? I think we may have signed another six or 800 or 1,000 canvassers

00:16:05.980 tonight and that was the goal. Yeah. I'm amazed at how this thing is going right now. And you know,

00:16:13.120 there were times I think back in the summertime, you go through the dog days of summer and you're

00:16:16.260 thinking, is this really going to fly? But I just think we're going to win this thing now.

00:16:20.340 Well, you know what? Let's be cautiously optimistic. Let's work really hard. Let's work every single

00:16:27.180 day and get it to the back. And then, you know what? We'll know. And you know, we have the

00:16:31.920 opportunity to do something that's never been done in Canada. And you know what? I think it's

00:16:35.440 going to be great for Albertans. Really, I do. And the thing I saw tonight, just the last question or

00:16:39.960 the last statement is that I saw people of all ages here tonight. I saw people bringing their

00:16:44.580 families here tonight. I interviewed people. I interviewed a young man who came here from

00:16:49.380 China. And he came here 15 years ago to be a Canadian. And he now wants to just be an 0.99

00:16:54.900 Albertan because he's seeing things happening in Canada that he saw.

00:16:59.560 They remind him of that.

00:17:00.300 Yes.

00:17:00.740 Yeah.

00:17:01.080 Well, and that's the big fear, right? That's our biggest problem. Our biggest problem is we're

00:17:06.140 very concerned with our lifestyle being absolutely changed. And Mr. Carney has actually made it

00:17:10.540 very clear that that is exactly what he's going to do with the new world order. How much clearer

00:17:15.340 can it be than that? So they're telling us what they're doing. So we just have to accept that

00:17:20.580 we're going to be on this side of that or that side of that. And it's plain and simple. The choices

00:17:25.080 are simple. Somebody said to me, well, how are you going to talk to the people that are going to

00:17:27.780 support you? I says, well, here's the way I see this. I see this, that we're going to become the

00:17:32.400 new world order or we're going to go back to being what we were. That seems to me to be the choices.

00:17:36.760 Right. And I'm not all about the new world order. I know what we were. I like that a lot.

00:17:41.680 Yeah. So the new world order doesn't work in my world. So that's kind of why we're working so

00:17:46.480 hard. Congratulations. Well, thanks, John. Thanks for your interview and thanks for everything you

00:17:50.800 do for us. Well, it's my pleasure. Just to be a small part of this is wonderful, but to be a part

00:17:55.360 of an event like this is terrific. It's fun, isn't it? It really is. You know, I feel like I'm with

00:17:59.680 friends here. Yeah, that's exactly correct. That's what the whole thing with all these events are for.

00:18:04.740 People understand that they're part of a group of like-minded people that think and have the

00:18:09.400 same ambitions and goals as they have. And it empowers people. And that's why our events are

00:18:14.180 getting bigger and bigger and bigger. And that's why people are lining up. Because people want to

00:18:17.800 be part of it. And they're very happy to do it. And they're not happy with the circumstance.

00:18:22.260 And so, you know, it's a perfect story. And thanks to Mitch for giving up a bit of his time. He's a very

00:18:27.780 busy man. It's always a pleasure to talk to him. I'm sure I'll have him on the channel again real

00:18:32.780 soon. By the way, if you are arranging an event when it comes to independence, let me know about

00:18:37.100 it. Maybe I'll interview you. And you can be on the independence calendar and keep your submissions

00:18:41.920 coming. I want to see more and more of them all the time. JohnBoltonAB at gmail.com.

00:18:48.080 I want to end with something kind of special today. I recorded the viewer submission segment as its own

00:18:55.720 video today because I got so many of them. And right after I finished it, I got an email in

00:19:00.560 that was written in French, thinking that it was coming from Quebec. Now, I want you to know,

00:19:07.020 folks, that the independence movement is worldwide. This is a global phenomenon now.

00:19:12.640 I got an email in from this man here. And it was in French. And I had it translated. And I have

00:19:17.940 edited his email. I think you're going to love this. It says, Dear John, it's a real pleasure to watch

00:19:24.040 your videos. We admire and support your efforts to liberate Alberta from the deadly grip of Canada.

00:19:29.400 My name is Vincent, married to Deborah. I have two children. He is from the Vendille region of France.

00:19:37.600 And he goes on to say he's being hammered with taxes there. He says, A year ago, we started the

00:19:42.560 process of relocating to Alberta. And check out his mug. This is great. The photo I'm sharing with you

00:19:49.920 is from my birthday morning, a gift from my family, a pretty mug for coffee. It really helps me get

00:19:55.440 through a hard day's work. Faith, family, freedom, Alberta. Love it. Thank you for your videos. Thank

00:20:02.660 you for your dedication to Alberta's independence. And who knows, maybe one day we'll have the pleasure

00:20:07.360 of meeting in person. Well, Vince, thank you so much. All the best to you and your family. If you're

00:20:12.020 ever in Calgary, if you're ever living in Calgary, you get in touch with me and we will raise our mugs

00:20:17.520 together and we will drink to Alberta's independence. Thank you so much for contacting me.

00:20:23.740 Again, if you want to get in touch, johnboltonab at gmail.com. I appreciate you watching. If you

00:20:29.880 like the video, give it a thumbs up, subscribe to the channel, ring the bell for notifications.

00:20:33.260 I'll see you on the next independence calendar.

John Bolton - February 01, 2026

Independence Calendar Episode #9 - February 1st, 2026

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