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Let’s time travel back to 2016 when the world found out that Prince Harry was dating Suits star, Meghan Markle. The British tabloids went into overdrive trying to learn everything they could about the actress. That’s when Harry leaped to protect his girlfriend with a big ask from the press — leave her alone.
The strongly worded statement issued by then-Kensington Palace communications secretary Jason Knauf (yes, that Jason Knauf) in November 2016 noted that “a line has been crossed” when it came to covering Meghan. “His girlfriend, Meghan Markle, has been subject to a wave of abuse and harassment,” read the statement. “Prince Harry is worried about Ms. Markle’s safety and is deeply disappointed that he has not been able to protect her. It is not right that a few months into a relationship with Ms. Markle should be subjected to such a storm.” The request worked for a hot minute until the tide turned on the Sussexes completely. Now, the statement has completely vanished from the Royal.uk website, per Newsweek.
The media outlet pointed out that Wayback Machine last archived the statement, which was located in the press release section of the royal’s site, on Dec. 3, 2023. Anything beyond Dec. 10 shows that the statement disappeared from the page. The 2023 year was fraught with headlines from Prince Harry’s memoir, Spare, and Omid Scobie’s book, Endgame, which corroborated many of the Duke of Sussex’s original claims about the couple’s treatment behind palace walls. Yet the statement Harry made in 2016 showed how much he loved her from the moment they met. He was worried about her safety as a private citizen, and he’s still concerned now that she’s his wife.
The statement came as a result of an awful Daily Mail headline that read, “Harry’s girl is (almost) straight outta Compton: Gang-scarred home of her mother revealed—so will he be dropping by for tea?” It was awful, but Harry confronted the issue head-on. “Some of this has been very public—the smear on the front page of a national newspaper; the racial undertones of comment pieces; and the outright sexism and racism of social media trolls and web article comments,” he said in 2016.
A source told The Times in 2022 that Prince Harry was concerned he would lose Meghan because of the press coverage. He wanted to do everything he could to protect her because he knew that no one else would. The insider shared, “It did feel like that if the palace was not able to stand up and support his girlfriend, against some of that disgusting coverage . . . then who in their right mind would ever consider entering into a relationship [with him] in the future? He definitely felt that if nothing was done to support her, then she would be, ‘I’m not sure this is what I signed up for.'” Now, the palace has erased the statement from its archives forever, perhaps hoping to forget the ugly headlines that taunted Meghan.
Before you go, click to see all the biggest royal scandals in the past 50 years.
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