Do we ever learn who Meowth's trainer is?


In the episode Island of the Giant Pokemon, Ekans and Koffing give a speech
about Pokemon not being bad, but rather obeying bad masters. Meowth responds
saying his master is never around and he still does bad things, implying that
Meowth is not owned by Jesse or James. Do we know who his trainer/master is?




In the anime, Team Rocket's Meowth is technically a wild Pokémon. Which is to
say he isn't bound to a Pokeball and thereby has no trainer.

The strongest evidence of this is during the Black & White series when
[Iris](https://bulbapedia.bulbagarden.net/wiki/Meowth_\(Team_Rocket\)#:%7E:text=Iris%20to%20attempt%20to%20capture%20him%20in%20a%20Pok%C3%A9%20Ball.%20The%20capture%20nearly%20succeeded%20but%20Meowth%20broke%20out%20and%20told%20her%20he%20was%20going%20to%20help%20her%20regardless)
and [Cliff](https://bulbapedia.bulbagarden.net/wiki/Cliff_\(BW046\)) try to
catch Meowth at various times with a Pokeball. Meowth actually gets sucked
into the Pokeball but breaks out before being properly captured each time. In
the anime, when you try to catch a Pokémon that already has a trainer, the
ball is shown to simply not work, it bounces off without opening or sucking
the Pokémon in. This has something to do with some kind of tagging system
which I don't think is ever explained in detail but for the most part
Pokeballs somehow "know" if a Pokémon is already bound to a Pokeball so that
you can't arbitrarily catch other people's Pokémon. Therefore, since Pokeballs
are working on Meowth he is not already bound to one and thus does not have a
trainer. He hangs out with the Team Rocket crew by choice, not because any of
them own him.

