Pro-Brexit Donald Trump arrives in UK on eve of EU referendum result to open controversial golf course

Republican Presidential candidate Donald Trump, who has said Britain should leave the EU, is to arrive in the UK to open his Scottish golf club Trump Turnberry on Thursday (23 June) as Britons go the polls in the EU referendum.

Trump has invested £200m ($288m) in the Ayrshire golf resort but has courted controversy over the property after he said he could withdraw his funds if he was barred from the UK.

MPs debated banning the billionaire from entry into the UK after an online petition, sparked by his comments calling for a ban on all Muslim immigration into the US, gained more than half a million signatories earlier this year.

Trump weighed into the UK referendum debate in May. "I would personally be more inclined to leave, for a lot of reasons, like having a lot less bureaucracy," he told reporters at the time.

A spokeswoman for South Ayrshire County Council told IBTimes UK that Trump was expected to speak to press at the opening of Trump Turnberry between 9:30am and 10am on Friday. The electoral commission has said results from the referendum debate are expected shortly beforehand.

However, Trump is understood to be travelling to Scotland in a business capacity. He has not announced any meetings with British politicians, breaking with tradition for a Republican nominee visiting the UK for the first time.

The reality TV star is expected to be met by protesters at the new resort. Earlier this week, hostile local residents living near the golf course raised Mexican flags near their homes, a statement on Trump's position on Mexican immigration to the United States and his comments about Latinos.

The Daily Telegraph reported that after speaking in Turnberry, Trump will fly to a second golf course in Aberdeenshire, opened in 2012 after he won a court battle to flatten coastal dunes.