Royal experts have blasted Harry’s ‘delusional’ assertions that he is ‘protecting’ the Queen and trying to make sure she has ‘the right people around her’ after he and Meghan quit royal duties, moved to California and plunged the Royal Family into crisis.
The duke’s remarks were also branded a ‘gross insult’ to Charles and William as NBC’s Today show aired an excerpt of their interview with the prince ahead of its full broadcast at midday today – just 24 hours before the elderly monarch’s 96th birthday.Harry and Meghan had visited the Queen for supposed ‘olive branch’ talks at Windsor Castle and met with Charles for just 15 minutes before flying out to Holland for the Invictus Games on what is the couple’s first public appearance in Europe together in two years. After the ‘peace’ summit, it was then reported that the Sussexes had been invited to appear on the Buckingham Palace balcony during the Platinum Jubilee celebrations, in what was widely interpreted as a sign that tensions had cooled somewhat.
But speaking to the Today show about his meeting with the Queen, the duke said: ‘Being with her it was great, it was just so nice to see her, she’s on great form. She’s always got a great sense of humour with me and I’m just making sure that she’s protected and got the right people around her. Both Meghan and I had tea with her, so it was really nice to catch up with her.’ Royal experts claimed that Harry’s astonishing remark was a ‘gross insult’ to Charles and William, with both of whom he has a deeply strained relationship, and evidence that the duke ‘doesn’t deserve to attend the Jubilee celebrations and be on the Balcony’. Others warned that Harry’s life risked becoming ‘totally distorted’ as he ‘becomes a Kardashian-type’.
It comes after he and Meghan skipped Prince Philip’s memorial service at Westminster Abbey last month over ‘security concerns’ and after the couple made a string of damaging claims, including of racism, against the Royal Family in their Oprah sit-down. The excerpt is also likely to have fuelled further fears in Buckingham Palace that the duke could drop more ‘truth-bombs’ in his new interview. Royal correspondent Robert Jobson tweeted: ‘Prince Harry says on US TV he is making sure the Queen is ‘protected and has the right people around her’. How so? I think you’ll find that Prince Charles and Her Majesty’s children and William are DOING just that and supporting the Queen, with actions – and not just words.’
Angela Levin, who wrote the book Harry: Conversations with the Prince, claimed: ‘Harry’s comment on US TV about him checking the Queen is protected is a gross insult to Prince Charles and William. He’s underlined even more that he doesn’t deserve to attend the Jubilee celebrations and be on the Balcony’. And former Conservative MP David Mellor told GB News: ‘On came the news about Harry saying his granny needs to be protected and I fell about. This was a real comic turn. The most best-paid comedian couldn’t be funnier than that. What is the man on? Or rather what is he off?
‘I mean, you just think to yourself, he is really showing signs. But I think what it is, his life is totally distorted now by becoming a Kardashian-type figure, where he’s surrounded by people who want to photograph him because they’re paying him lots of money for the privilege of filming him, and the Queen becomes important to him only because he has to see the Queen for his credibility on Netflix.
