Plus, how Alex Jones spreads disinformation on extreme weather …
From the Editor's Desk
Canada’s leader Mark Carney this week balked at Donald Trump’s latest tariff threats, claiming his country wouldn’t settle for a “bad deal.” But with the deadline looming next week, the U.S. president’s push to strong-arm Canada and other countries into a trade deal just got darker.
As David Falk reports, DeSmog reveals that Trump officials discussed a secret $500 million loan to Alberta to help the oil-rich province break away from Canada altogether.
The bombshell comes not from leaked memos — but directly from Dennis Modry, head of a Canadian separatist group. Modry claims Trump officials privately expressed support for Alberta becoming a “sovereign nation.”
“I met the senior U.S. administrative officials just a couple steps away from the president himself,” recalled Modry, the former CEO of the climate denial separatist group, Alberta Prosperity Project.
“When we walked into the conference room, the first comment was ‘We recognize and support Alberta becoming the sovereign nation for the first time,’” he said. Read the full story here.
Separatist sentiment in Alberta is not new, as DeSmog’s Danielle Paradis wrote in May. Her eye-opening revealed that a Calgary lawyer is pitching Alberta to the U.S. to become the 51st state.
The cowboy-hat-clad attorney behind the drive said Alberta is “fed up” with the required carbon tax and equalization payments that
Alberta makes to other provinces.
But now with Trump beating the Big Oil drum, slashing regulations, and threatening huge tariffs, the Canadian separatists’ claims are all part of a bigger fossil-fueled push to reshape North America. The idea is to force Canada to cave to a U.S.-friendly gas deal by August 1, prop up Alberta’s oil ambitions, and weaken federal climate policy.
Trump’s second presidency has bolstered the efforts of climate denial think tanks to advance his pro-fossil fuel agenda. Now climate science deniers are flooding social media with false claims during extreme weather events, drowning out reliable information and putting lives at risk, according to a new report by the Center for Countering Digital Hate (CCDH).
DeSmog’s Adam Barnett digs deep into the report, which finds that anti-climate figures are increasingly spreading false information about wildfires and hurricanes fuelled by climate change.
Take notorious U.S. conspiracy theorist Alex Jones. The report reveals that his social media posts on extreme weather between April 2023 and April 2025 received 408 million views – more than emergency services and mainstream media combined.
CCDH used DeSmog’s climate disinformation database to identify the most prominent deniers to analyze. Read more here and delve into our databases for more climate deniers of note.
Have a story tip or feedback? Get in touch: [email protected]. Want to know what our UK team is up to? Sign up for our UK newsletter.
Thanks,
Brendan DeMelle
Executive Director
P.S. DeSmog continues to keep you informed about threats to our climate across the globe — from up-to-the minute reporting to essential database profiles that help others fight climate denial and delay. Can you donate $10 or $20 right now to support more of this essential work?
Image credit: Gage Skidmore / Flickr (CC-BY-SA-2.0)
Trump Officials Discussed $500M Alberta Independence Loan, Separatist Claims
— By David Falk (4 min. read) —
Private details from a Washington D.C., meeting about Alberta becoming the 51st state were revealed at a separatism event attended by DeSmog.
Extreme Weather Events are the New Frontline of Online Climate Denial – Report
— By Adam Barnett (3 min. read) —
Social media posts by conspiracy theorist Alex Jones received 408 million views – more than emergency services and mainstream media combined.
Meet the Calgary Lawyer Pitching Alberta to the U.S. as the 51st State
— Danielle Paradis (5 min. read) —
Jeffrey Rath recently went on Fox & Friends to discuss the oil-rich province “becoming a U.S. territory.”
— By Stella Levantesi (3 min) —
Decision paves the way for future environmental cases in Italian courts and represents the latest EU nation to hold Big Oil accountable through litigation.
How MAGA Lobbying is Undermining
EU Climate Rules
— By Sam Bright (5 min. read) —
European leaders are bending to the demands of U.S. climate science deniers.
From the Climate Disinformation Database: The Alberta Prosperity Project
The Alberta Prosperity Project (APP) describes itself as “a not-for-profit, non-partisan educational society, uniting all Albertans, businesses, and organizations to protect their prosperity, interests, freedoms, rights, and self-determination.” Its stance on climate change can be summed up by APP member Chris Scott’s 2022 comment: “All of us, at least a growing number of us, are starting to realize that this climate change agenda is a scam. It’s an absolute scam. It has no base in science. The science they used to perpetrate this on us is junk science.” APP’s CEO Dennis Modry has promoted climate denier Alex Epstein, who has spoken at APP events, as “an important ally for us as we fight against this false narrative about climate change.”
Read the full profile and browse other individuals and organizations in our Climate Disinformation Database, Ad & PR Database, and Koch Network Database.
