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Elections Alberta has verified nearly 221,000 completed mail-in ballots, representing roughly one-third of the 652,000 electors who have been sent voting packages ahead of the province’s Oct. 19 referendum.Jeff McIntosh/The Canadian Press
Thousands of Albertans may not have their ballots counted for the province’s coming referendum after Elections Alberta said more than 3,000 voters failed to properly identify themselves in the mail-in voting process.
The provincial elections agency said it has reached out to those electors, most of whom incorrectly filled out the voter declaration form that must be submitted alongside their ballots, asking them to resubmit documentation over e-mail.
“If they provide the required information, by email, we can process their special ballot,” Maia Hanrahan, spokesperson for Elections Alberta, said in an e-mail to The Globe and Mail.
“If they do not, we cannot process their special ballot, and it will be rejected.”
The agency has been working to assuage concerns about election integrity in the home stretch of the referendum campaign.
Elections Alberta opens applications for special referendum mail-in ballots
Elections Alberta has verified nearly 221,000 completed mail-in ballots, Ms. Hanrahan said, representing roughly one-third of the 652,000 electors who have been sent voting packages ahead of the province’s Oct. 19 referendum.
The errors add to a list of problems that have plagued the mail-in voting process, just one component of a referendum that Elections Alberta says is one of the biggest electoral events in Canadian history.
The referendum centres around 10 questions – all designed by Premier Danielle Smith’s government – asking voters to weigh in on provincial separation, immigration and constitutional issues.
The sweeping vote has forced Elections Alberta to order 45 million ballots for the 10 separate questions, more than twice the number of ballots cast nationwide in the 2025 federal election.
It has also hired more than 41,000 election workers and received roughly 65,000 applications, Ms. Hanrahan said on Tuesday. The agency is hoping to hire an unprecedented 60,000-plus election workers – more than four times the number who helped in Alberta’s 2023 provincial general election.
Elections Alberta receives 225,000 requests for referendum mail-in ballots
Nearly one-fifth of Alberta voters, meanwhile, have seized the opportunity to vote by mail, the first time Albertans have had unrestricted access to the process for a provincewide election.
The agency is asking voters to mail their ballots by Oct. 9 to ensure their votes are counted.
In order to vote by mail, Alberta requires electors to request a special ballot package and return the ballots along with a copy of their valid identification, and a declaration form containing their personal information and signature.
Ms. Hanrahan wrote that some voters filled out their declaration incorrectly by putting their birthdate in the signature line, not signing the declaration, or failing to fill out the entire form. She added that other voters either neglected to send a copy of their ID or there were other issues with the document.
Elections Alberta is asking those voters to rectify those issues by e-mailing the agency a new declaration form or copy of their ID.
“Without these two pieces of information, we are unable to verify and count their submitted special ballot, and it would be rejected,” she wrote.
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The agency has been proactively responding on social media to voters who were notified that they need to send in more documentation.
Elections Alberta has been forced to address a crop of issues in the lead up to the referendum. Some of the first declaration forms sent to electors, for example, incorrectly included a section asking voters to testify that they’re unable to vote in person. Alberta voters were previously prohibited from voting by mail unless they could prove they were unable to.
Elections Alberta also found 313 mail-in packages sent to electors that were missing ballots.
Some observers have pointed to repeated warnings from Elections Alberta – an arm’s-length government agency – that it is underfunded and understaffed.
In its annual report, published in November, 2025, chief electoral officer Gordon McClure referenced “systemic deficiencies” at the agency, including high staff turnover, insufficient resources and a “lack of backup in critical positions and areas.”
That report was published roughly three months before Ms. Smith unveiled her plans for the October referendum. In May, Mr. McClure told a legislative committee that he’s “drinking from a firehose.”
Federalist campaigns have embraced mail-in voting, while separatist camps have been split over the system. Last month, lawyer and pro-independence organizer Keith Wilson said it’s critical his supporters vote at the mailbox. Prominent separatist leader Mitch Sylvestre, meanwhile, said he has “no faith in the system at all.”