Remember back in simpler times, in 2019, when @MLS didn't want its fans making political statements?
Yeah, the reason for that is most of their owners are conservatives who didn't want political statements they disagree with.
Yeah, the reason for that is most of their owners are conservatives who didn't want political statements they disagree with.
Ownership in MLS is, for the most part, at odds politically with its players and fan base.
This isn't' to suggest there aren't left-leaning MLS owners. There are a few.
And this isn't to suggest there aren't conservative American soccer players (Geoff Cameron, hello!) or supporters. There are.
And this isn't to suggest there aren't conservative American soccer players (Geoff Cameron, hello!) or supporters. There are.
But most of them are conservative. It's not just Dell Loy Hansen, who is a frequent GOP donor. (He even gave his employees "bonuses" in 2006 and forced them to give them to a Republican candidate to skirt campaign finance laws.)
Phil Anschutz, the @LAGalaxy owner and patron saint of MLS who kept it afloat for a decade, is best buds w/ Dick Cheney, has long donated to GOP politicians and conservative political groups, including those that are prominently anti-LGBTQ and choice and the Federalist Society.
Carl Lidener III, @fccincinnati's owner. and his father, Carl, Jr. have long donated to GOP and conservative causes, founded a big Christian school in Cincinnati and Lidener III was appointed by Donald Trump to the Kennedy Center Board and Trump attended his son’s wedding.
Across the state, @ColumbusCrewSC owner Jimmy Haslam, the savior of #SaveTheCrew, is a long-time GOP fund-raiser, was a college roommate with former GOP senator Bob Corker and his brother, Bill, was the Republican governor of Tennessee.
@ColoradoRapids owner Stan Kroenke has donated to both sides of the aisle but is a registered Republican and gave a million bucks to Trump’s inaugural fund. His wife, Ann Walton-Kroenke, is a Walmart heiress and part of a family w/ a long history of donating to the GOP.
@FCDallas' Clark Hunt comes from a family with longstanding ties to the GOP and ultraconservative causes. Granddad Nelson Hunt was a board member of the John Birch Society and heavily funded the Preservation of Liberty Foundation, which was implicated in the Iran-Contra scandal.
Clark Hunt has frequently contributed to Republican politicians including John Cornyn, Roy Blount and Rick Santorum for President. (Seriously.)
Bennett Rosenthal, a co-lead investor at @LAFC, has frequently donated to GOP candidates, including Mitt Romney and Ben Quale. (Donating to Romney doesn't seem so bad these days!)
Before he became #HandJobBob, @NERevolution owner Robert Kraft was a frequent political contributor to both parties, two-thirds of which tended to go to Democrats. But his left-leaning ways took a weird turn as he is very friendly and close with Donald Trump.
Members of @SportingKC's ownership group - Neal Patterson, Cliff Ilig and Robb Heineman, were among the biggest contributors to former GOP governor/Senator Sam Brownback. Ilig and Patterson have also donated to conservative PACs and to GOP Senator Jerry Moran.
Lead owner of @MNUFC Bill McGuire has regularly donated to Republican politicians including GOP senators Norm Coleman, Bill Frist and #MoscowMitch McConnell.
@SJEarthquakes co-owner John J. FIsher is a consistent and frequent GOP contributor while co-owner Lew Wolff seems to donate mostly to Democrats (or a PAC like Emily’s list) but has also donated to Republicans like Mitt Romney.
It's not just the American ownership groups that are mostly to the right politically.
The Rogers family, which owns the media corporation that bears its name and is a primary owner of Maple Leaf Sports, which in turn owns @TorontoFC, has long ties to the conservative parties of multiple countries.
Ted Rogers, Jr. was a well-known supporter of the conservative Tories in Canada and his wife, the former Loretta Ann Robinson, is the daughter of former British covervative MP Jack Robinson.
City Football Group, majority owners of @NYCFC, is primarily owned by Sheik Mansour bin Zayed Al Nahyan of the royal family of the United Arab Emirates, where he is deputy prime minister.
The UAE has a horrendous record of human rights abuses with political dissent frequently punished with torture, censorship common and religious freedom non-existant and antiquated laws on women’s and LGBTQ rights and human trafficking.
The minority owners are the Steinbrenner family, thu the @Yankees. While Hal and Hank have largely been apolitical, at least publicly, their father, the late George, was convicted of making illegal campaign contributions to Richard Nixon.
The worst of the bunch might be Red Bull founder and owner Dietrich Mateschitz of @NewYorkRedBulls, who has vocally expressed right-wing views, his TV station hosts far-right speakers a la Fox News and he recently founded an Austiran version of Breitbart News.
Not all conservatives are racist. Not all Republicans are bad people. Having differing political views and supporting causes that align with them isn't necessarily a bad thing and not all the MLS owners should be seen negatively just because we disagree with their politics.
HOWEVAH...
Just as we saw last year with the flareup last year between @ISCSupporters members and MLS teams, don't be surprised when MLS teams - despite the league putting on a happy, we support you face - quietly oppose much of the protests we're seeing in sports right now.
Just as we saw last year with the flareup last year between @ISCSupporters members and MLS teams, don't be surprised when MLS teams - despite the league putting on a happy, we support you face - quietly oppose much of the protests we're seeing in sports right now.
