Meet the groups spending the most on social media ads attacking the carbon tax

This story is a collaboration between the Investigative Journalism Foundation and CBC Saskatchewan.

Conservative Leader Pierre Poilievre says the next election will be the "carbon tax election," but his campaign isn't the only one calling for an end to Canada's carbon pricing policy.

The Investigative Journalism Foundation (IJF) analyzed social media advertising over the last year to see who is echoing Poilievre's "axe the tax" mantra. Apart from politicians and political parties, the biggest spender is an outfit most Canadians have never heard of.

A social media page called Energy United describes itself as a grassroots campaign in support of Canada's oil and gas industry. Despite its claims of being grassroots, the campaign has links to the largest fossil fuel industry advocacy group in the country, and it is spending big on social media ads denouncing federal carbon pricing.

The campaign spent between $135,200 and $174,435 on 65 Facebook and Instagram ads that ran between Nov. 1, 2023, and Oct. 31, 2024, making it the fourth-highest spenderon carbon tax ads in the past year. Meta estimates Energy United's ads have been seen by up to 16.5 million people.

Some other notable spenders were the Canadian Taxpayers Federation, which describes itself as a "not-for-profit citizen's group dedicated to lower taxes, less waste and accountable government." It is the seventh-highest spender on carbon tax ads in the past year.

The three biggest spenders on carbon tax-related ads on Meta's platforms in the past year were Pierre Poilievre's Facebook page, which spent between $287,600 and $379,539, followed by the Ontario PC Party ($191,000 to $240,560) and the Conservative Party of Canada ($152,600 to $201,825).

Shane Gunster, a Simon Fraser University professor of communications, said pro-oil groups that are spending big on ads panning the policy are not only capitalizing on political messaging denouncing the carbon tax, but have "laid the political and emotional terrain for the Conservatives to exploit [it] so effectively."

He said the groups are "as involved in making it possible for Poilievre and the Conservatives to make this a 'carbon tax election' as they are in taking advantage of conservative efforts to do that."

Who is Energy United?

Energy United's ads feature language like,"Let's push to make things in more affordable for you and your family this summer. Help us get the carbon tax axed,"and, " A boat is a hole in the water you throw your money into.The carbon tax is a hand in your pocket taking money from you."

According to its website, the Energy United campaign was created by a federally-registered non-profit called the Maple Leaf Institute (MLI), which is registered to lobby the federal government.

Though the Maple Leaf Institute has little presence online, it's led by a team with strong links to oilsands advocacy group the Canadian Association of Petroleum Producers (CAPP) and the Saskatchewan Party.

The institute's four directors are Tim Harold McMillan, Cole David Schulz, Samantha Yaholnitsky and Dale Richardson.

McMillan was the president and CEO of CAPP from 2015 to 2022. Before joining CAPP, McMillan was a minister of energy and resources and minister of rural and remote health in Saskatchewan.

He's now a board member of the Canadian Taxpayers Federation and runs public affairs firm Garrison Strategy with another Maple Leaf Institute director, Cole David Schulz.

Before starting Garrison Strategy, Schulz was the vice president of communications at CAPP. He was the chief of staff to McMillan when he was minister of energy in Saskatchewan and was a special advisor to McMillan when he was president of CAPP.

Richardson and Yaholnitsky were working for the Saskatchewan government at the same time as McMillan and Schulz.

Yaholnitsky recently served as the campaign manager for the unsuccessful Saskatoon mayoral campaign of former Saskatchewan Party minister Gordon Wyant.

Jarret Coels, campaign director for the Energy United campaign, was the manager of strategic communications for CAPP between 2019 and 2023. He worked in the Saskatchewan government between 2010 and 2019.

Coels appears to be the owner of another website called A Better YXE,which describes itself as a grassroots campaign and has run dozens of Meta ads about Saskatoon municipal politics, including during the recent municipal election period.

While A Better YXE says it is not affiliated with any political party, Yaholnitsky previously confirmed she was involved with the page before quitting to work on Wyant's campaign.

Coels and Richardson were also involved in Canada Growth Council, a third-party advertising organization that ran the Manitoba Watch campaign during that province's 2023 election.

The group gained attention after it sent a mass text to Manitoba voters that misrepresented the NDP's position on policing and harm reduction. Canada Growth Council had formerly co-ordinated a similar campaign during the 2019 federal election.

Neither Energy United, Coels, nor any of the directors of the Maple Leaf Institute responded to a request for comment.

When Simon Enoch, a director of the Canadian Centre for Policy Alternatives, saw the messaging by Energy United, he told the IJF it was "striking" that the campaign "mirrors the Saskatchewan government's talking points pretty closely. We've heard the exact same arguments from this government time and again."

Planting the seed

Several other groups with unclear ownership were among the highest spenders and most prolific advertisers about the carbon tax.

Affordability Advocates is a Facebook page with a following of less than 200 people, but it spent between $54,900 and $73,388.00 on ads, the sixth-most since Nov. 1, 2023.

Fair Share Report and Debunk Inc. also made the top 20 list for spending on ads, and both groups post content railing against environmental regulations.

It's almost impossible to know how effective a single social media ad campaign is at changing public opinion, but an Abacus Data poll from January 2024 found that 47 per cent of Canadians surveyed believed the carbon tax is responsible for broad price increases on multiple products.

Gordon Laxer, a professor emeritus of political economy at the University of Alberta, said the seed for the grassroots-style communication strategy was planted over a decade ago, when Canada's oil and gas industry feared it was losing the war of public opinion to environmentalists.

He said major Canadian oil industry players were advised by their U.S. counterparts at the American Petroleum Institute to mobilize support from everyday Canadians, in addition to traditional lobbying.

The marketing method appears to be an effective strategy.

Gunster said that when he researched oil and gas industry messaging on social media, he found corporate communications from fossil fuel companies like Cenovus and Enbridge were getting almost no traction.

But what was getting traction online was what Gunster calls "memes," posts consisting of a graphic and a quote or a very simple one or two sentence talking point.

This type of post containing simplistic language and graphics that get at the heart of oil and gas industry supporters' anxieties is a common theme among the biggest spenders in the analysis.

"What they really were very effective at doing is taking the sort of industry worldview and fragmenting it or boiling it down to maybe 50 talking points," Gunster said. "And they were very, very easy to share."

Not only does seeing information shared by a friend, uncle or parent make it more credible, but "in sharing this content, these people are building a social and political identity around becoming an advocate for these kinds of perspectives."

Gunster said Facebook seems to be "the platform of choice" and "primary mechanism of distribution." for this type of oil industry support group and the conservative right in Canada.

Energy United also has multiple active ads on Google, though that platform doesn't report the amount spent, nor the reach of the ads.