Max Verstappen recently signed a sponsorship deal with Heineken worth €30 million for six years [$32,400,000]. This is added to the huge $60 million deal he currently has with Red Bull. Despite this, the Red Bull driver pays 0 tax in his home country. Now, citing this, Rutger Bregman, a renowned Dutch historian called the former out on LinkedIn.
Admittedly, the recent sponsorship that Verstappen got from Dutch company Heineken is the biggest ever given to a citizen from the Netherlands. The Dutch driver, known for his ever-growing popularity in the sport has been roped in to be the face of Heineken’s new responsible drinking campaign.
Despite that and all the earnings he has right now, the allegation against Verstappen was that he does not give anything back to the country. Pointing this out, the Dutch author recently decided to slam the two-time world champion.
Dutch historian calls out Verstappen on tax evasion
Rutger C. Bregman is a 35-year-old historian hailing from the Netherlands. He has four books to his name and is quite popular in The Netherlands. Therefore, his criticism has gained hefty traction.
Taking on his LinkedIn account, he wrote, “Max Verstappen has closed another million-dollar deal. This time to promote Heineken 0.0. Seems very appropriate to me. 0 is really his number. He pays about the same amount of tax, and it’s also a nice nod to his fans’ resilience.”
Although it definitely wasn’t easy today, we did a great job in tricky conditions @redbullracing 💪 Very happy to grab this Pole Position in front of all of you today! 🇳🇱 Thank you very much for the support 🦁 pic.twitter.com/BwRXaXUlwf
— Max Verstappen (@Max33Verstappen) August 26, 2023
The defending champion was born in Belgium and grew up in the Netherlands. However, he does not pay any tax since he lives in Monaco right now. Interestingly, this was not the first time Bregman hit out at the Red Bull driver for evading tax.
Max Verstappen has been on Bregman’s radar for long
Bregman, three months ago, bashed Max Verstappen the same way as he noted a $200 million tax evasion on the F1 driver’s part. He said that the 25-year-old’s contribution to the Netherlands and Belgium is zero. Despite using these countries to become what he is today, he now gives back nothing to the country.
The historian also called out the fact that the two-time world champion was called a “hero” for his achievements in Formula 1. He, then questioned how ‘people like Verstappen’ get to use the national flag when they are not contributing anything to the country.
My upcoming home race of course calls for a special Dutch Grand Prix helmet design ✍🇳🇱 See you in Zandvoort 🦁
You can get your scale model helmets now on https://t.co/46lRXQtA7q pic.twitter.com/BPsMpLDeMf
— Max Verstappen (@Max33Verstappen) August 15, 2023
Additionally, Bregman called the F1 driver “greedy” and mentioned that he does not work for the country, but only for himself. With that, the historian demanded the government to bend the rules to bring people like Max Verstappen to pay taxes.
However, the fans and Dutch citizens came together to defend their star driver, as they criticized the author. They said that Verstappen is a Dutch hero and took his country, The Netherlands to a whole new level. He put them on the F1 world’s roadmap.
