During the interview, the couple gave viewers insights into their strained relationship with the British royal family following their step back from royal life.
The couple claimed that Prince Charles stopped taking Prince Harry’s calls after he resigned from royal duties, and that Kate Middleton made Meghan Markle cry during the week of her wedding.
Markle also shared that she was having suicidal thoughts because of constant coverage from British tabloids, but wasn’t allowed to get help during her time as a senior member of the royal family.
Also, one of the biggest bombshells from the interview was when Harry and Meghan said that an unnamed royal family member made racist remarks about their son Archie’s skin tone.
After the interview aired, Winfrey said Harry wouldn’t confirm which royal made the comments but said it was not the queen or Prince Philip.
“The issues raised, particularly that of race, are concerning,” Buckingham Palace said in a statement in response to the interview. “While some recollections may vary, they are taken very seriously and will be addressed by the family privately.”
While Harry told Winfrey that he was back on speaking terms with Charles, reports by British media claimed that the prince and his father had “barely spoken” since the interview, and that the two had only had a handful of “fraught” phone conversations since Harry moved to the US.
The reports also said that their relationship worsened when Harry made a public statement about Mahfouz Marei Mubarak bin Mahfouz, the Saudi billionaire who was reportedly offered an honorary knighthood by Charles’ closest aide Michael Fawcett in exchange for donations to the royal’s charity.
Fawcett stepped down following the allegations of misconduct in September 2021. Then, in December, a spokesperson for the Duke of Sussex told The Sunday Times that Harry had “expressed his concerns about the donor” after a meeting with him in 2013.
Just days before their interview with Winfrey aired, bullying allegations against the Duchess of Sussex surfaced in a Times of London report.
At the time, two senior staffers said they’d been bullied by Markle, claiming she had left them “humiliated” and that her actions felt “like emotional cruelty and manipulation”.
