Manchester United co-owner Sir Jim Ratcliffe has inspired a crisis of confidence from sections of the club’s fanbase after claiming that the U.K. was “on the slide” due, in part, to what he called “the immigration problem.”
Ratcliffe, who owns more than a quarter of United and has sporting control of the club, is one of Britain’s richest people and was a staunch advocate for the nation to leave the European Union in 2016. The Mancunian petrochemical billionaire found himself in the spotlight back in February after claiming that the U.K. had been “colonized by immigrants” while making factually incorrect statements about the country’s population growth. Ratcliffe subsequently apologized for “offending some people.”
