Deborah Drever (born August 15, 1988) is a Canadian who was a politician elected in the 2015 general election to the

Legislative Assembly of Alberta The Legislative Assembly of Alberta is the deliberative assembly of the province of Alberta, Canada. It sits in the Alberta Legislature Building in Edmonton. The Legislative Assembly currently has 87 members, elected first past the post from sin ...

, representing the electoral district of

Calgary-Bow Calgary-Bow is a provincial electoral district in the city of Calgary, Alberta, Canada. The district is one of 87 districts mandated to return a single member (MLA) to the Legislative Assembly of Alberta using the first past the post method of ...

. A sociology student at

Mount Royal University Mount Royal University (MRU) is a public university in Calgary, Alberta, Canada. History Mount Royal University was founded by Alberta provincial charter by the Arthur Sifton government on December 16, 1910 and officially opened on September 8, ...

in Calgary, she defeated Progressive Conservative challenger Byron Nelson in the May 5, 2015, election in a riding that had historically elected Conservative candidates. She was elected as a member of the

Alberta New Democratic Party The Alberta New Democratic Party (french: Nouveau Parti démocratique de l'Alberta), commonly shortened to Alberta's NDP, is a social-democratic political party in Alberta, Canada. It is the provincial Alberta affiliate of the federal New Demo ...

, but was sworn in as an

independent Independent or Independents may refer to: Arts, entertainment, and media Artist groups * Independents (artist group), a group of modernist painters based in the New Hope, Pennsylvania, area of the United States during the early 1930s * Independ ...

MLA after being barred from the caucus because of a controversy about her social media activities prior to her candidacy. In 2016, she was readmitted to the NDP caucus. Deborah Drever ran for re-election in the

2019 Alberta general election The 2019 Alberta general election was held on April 16, 2019, to elect 87 members to the 30th Alberta Legislature. In its first general election contest, the Jason Kenney-led United Conservative Party (UCP) won 54.88% of the popular vote and 63 ...

, but was defeated by

Demetrios Nicolaides Demetrios Nicolaides () is a Canadian politician who was elected in the 2019 Alberta general election to represent the electoral district of Calgary-Bow in the 30th Alberta Legislature. He is a member of the United Conservative Party. On April ...

of the

United Conservative Party The United Conservative Party of Alberta (UCP) is a conservative political party in the province of Alberta, Canada. It was established in July 2017 as a merger between the Progressive Conservative Association of Alberta and the Wildrose Party ...

, as the UCP gained back all but a handful of seats they had lost in the Calgary area in 2015.

Political career

Social media controversy

Immediately after the 2015 election, Drever was criticized on social media after pictures from her Facebook page were circulated that showed somebody giving

the finger In Western culture, "the finger", or the middle finger (as in giving someone the (middle) finger, the bird or flipping someone off) is an obscene hand gesture. The gesture communicates moderate to extreme contempt, and is roughly equivalent i ...

to the Canadian flag and Drever posing with a "Magic Weed" (marijuana) tee-shirt."New Calgary-Bow MLA takes down questionable Facebook page"
'' Calgary Herald'', May 6, 2015. The pictures were later removed from her Facebook account. On May 15, 2015, Drever again attracted controversy when it was discovered that she posed in an assault scene for a music album cover. The image raised concerns among some observers who saw it as promoting sexual violence against women. Petitions were started and a protest was organized, asking Drever to resign. On May 20, 2015, Premier-designate

Rachel Notley Rachel Anne Notley (born April 17, 1964) is a Canadian politician who served as the 17th premier of Alberta from 2015 to 2019, and has been the leader of the Opposition since 2019. She sits as the member of the Legislative Assembly (MLA) for ...

announced that she had directed Drever, as a result of the media attention, to create a plan to improve education on violence against women, particularly outreach to groups working with vulnerable young women. Two days later, the NDP announced that Drever had been suspended from caucus after a homophobic remark was found posted from Drever's Instagram account. Notley said that she would review Drever's status within a year."Here's the image that finally got NDP MLA Deborah Drever suspended from caucus"
. '' Calgary Herald'', May 22, 2015.

29th Alberta Legislature

Drever wrote a private member's bill designed to protect victims of domestic violence by allowing them to break leases and move out of their rental accommodations early. Her bill was unanimously approved by the legislature in the fall of 2015 and won her accolades from both sides of the legislative assembly. In January 2016, after Premier Notley decided that Drever had exceeded the criteria given to her in order to be readmitted into the government caucus, she was allowed to rejoin the NDP caucus.

Electoral history

2015 general election

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Drever, Deborah 1988 births Alberta New Democratic Party MLAs Living people Politicians from Calgary Women MLAs in Alberta Independent Alberta MLAs 21st-century Canadian politicians 21st-century Canadian women politicians