Prince Harry and Meghan Markle reportedly pursued a far more ambitious role in American political life than previously known after leaving their duties as senior members of the British royal family, including an alleged effort by Markle to position herself for Kamala Harris’ U.S. Senate seat and a later attempt by the couple to secure an Oval Office meeting with President Joe Biden.
According to a source cited by the New York Post, Markle sought a meeting with California Gov. Gavin Newsom in the weeks leading up to the 2020 presidential election because she “wanted to be considered to be appointed” to Harris’ Senate seat if the California senator became vice president. The source said the conversation was publicly portrayed as a welcome-to-California discussion in an effort to head off questions about its purpose.
It remains unclear how seriously Newsom considered any such request. After Harris resigned from the Senate shortly before becoming vice president on Jan. 20, 2021, Newsom selected then-California Secretary of State Alex Padilla to fill the vacancy. Padilla went on to win a full six-year Senate term in the 2022 election.
A source close to Harry and Meghan strongly denied that Markle had sought Harris’ Senate seat
A memorandum from Newsom’s office that emerged in February 2021 showed that the governor held an “introductory meeting” with Harry and Meghan on Oct. 19, 2020. Newsom’s office characterized the conversation as social and did not disclose what was discussed. It was unclear whether Markle separately sought another meeting with the governor following the election.
Had Markle actually been appointed to the Senate, her status as the Duchess of Sussex could have raised significant constitutional questions. Article I, Section 9, Clause 8 of the Constitution provides that “no Person holding any Office of Profit or Trust … shall, without the Consent of the Congress, accept of any present, Emolument, Office, or Title, of any kind whatever, from any King, Prince, or foreign State.”
The presence of a member of the British royal family in the U.S. Senate could also have collided with longstanding American hostility toward hereditary titles. Alexander Hamilton wrote in “The Federalist Papers” that “the importance of the prohibition of titles of nobility … [is] the corner-stone of republican government; for so long as they are excluded, there can never be serious danger that the government will be any other than that of the people.”
The reported interest in Harris’ Senate seat was not the only effort by Harry and Meghan to establish connections at the highest levels of American politics after their departure from royal duties.
In late 2021, the couple sought a meeting with Biden inside the Oval Office and also requested accommodations at Blair House, the presidential guest residence generally used to host foreign dignitaries during official visits, according to multiple sources.
White House officials rejected the proposal. One source said an Oval Office appearance featuring Biden alongside Harry and Meghan “would have caused a major diplomatic kerfuffle” with both the British government and the Royal Family.
A former Biden administration official said Biden and first lady Jill Biden, both admirers of Queen Elizabeth II, were wary of becoming entangled in the highly publicized tensions between Harry and other members of his family.
The Bidens “didn’t want to get into a family squabble,” the source said.
An Oval Office reception and stay at Blair House would have given Harry and Meghan a significant boost in stature as they attempted to establish a new public identity in the United States following their January 2020 departure from frontline royal duties, widely dubbed “Megxit.”
The couple enlisted several political consultants with ties to the Obama administration, including Miranda Barbot, who currently serves as Harry’s chief of staff. Those connections reportedly helped provide a channel to the Biden White House through which the couple’s request was communicated.
Jen Psaki, who served as Biden’s White House press secretary after previously working as communications director in the Obama administration, was reportedly among those connections. Psaki wrote in her 2024 memoir, “Say More,” that Markle once sent a box of lemons to her home in Virginia so that Psaki could personally bring them through White House security and deliver them to Jill Biden’s East Wing office.
A source close to the Sussexes denied Thursday that Harry and Meghan had requested either an Oval Office meeting or accommodations at Blair House. However, the couple reportedly made another unusual request involving the presidency the following year.
After Queen Elizabeth II’s funeral in September 2022, Harry and Meghan inquired about returning to the United States aboard Air Force One, according to the report.
That request was quickly rejected.
The couple also became involved in American political issues through public statements and advocacy. During a September 2020 video appearance for Time magazine, they encouraged Americans to vote and “reject hate speech,” remarks widely interpreted at the time as favoring Biden. The intervention drew criticism from those who argued that Harry and Meghan were violating the British royal tradition of remaining outside partisan politics.
“I wish a lot of luck to Harry, because he’s going to need it,” Trump responded dismissively to the couple’s appeal.
Markle, who remained an American citizen after marrying Harry in 2018, later became directly involved in a major legislative debate. In November 2021, she personally contacted several U.S. senators as part of an effort to advocate for federally mandated paid family leave.
Despite those moves, Harry and Meghan never succeeded in establishing the kind of major political influence they reportedly sought, with their attempts to build a significant role in American politics eventually losing momentum alongside setbacks in some of their Hollywood and lifestyle ventures.
Sources said the couple also eventually exhausted some of the goodwill they initially enjoyed within the Biden administration, despite the Bidens’ personal sympathy toward Harry over the death of his mother, Princess Diana, in a 1997 automobile crash. Biden had himself endured a devastating family tragedy when his first wife, Neilia, and infant daughter, Naomi, were killed in a 1972 car accident that also injured his sons Beau and Hunter.
Jill Biden had meanwhile been a regular presence at the Invictus Games, the international sporting competition for wounded military personnel founded by Harry in 2014, and had frequently appeared alongside the prince at the event. After becoming first lady in January 2021, however, she stopped attending, reportedly because of concerns over the political and diplomatic optics created by Harry’s split from the Royal Family.
{Matzav.com}
