Oprah Winfrey shares more of her groundbreaking interview with Prince Harry and Meghan, Duchess of Sussex, after the two-hour show aired on CBS Sunday night.
In previously unseen clips, the couple discuss why they believe race played a difference in the way Meghan was treated by Buckingham Palace and British tabloids. They also talk about a visit to Queen Elizabeth that was suddenly called off after the couple’s decision to relinquish their royal duties in early 2020.
During the Sunday special, the Duchess of Sussex broke with previous media stories and told Winfrey that Kate Middleton, Duchess of Cambridge, made her days before her wedding cry. Previous reports had stated that Meghan had made Kate cry about the arrangements for the ceremony.
The Duchess of Sussex also revealed them second child, expected this summer, would be a girl. They also claimed concerns had been raised within Buckingham Palace before their first son, Archie, was born, about how dark his complexion could be. Winfrey, who joined “CBS This Morning” the day after the interview aired, said Prince Harry wanted to make it clear that the comments were not made by Queen Elizabeth or Prince Phillip.
Gayle King, co-host of CBS This Morning, said Winfrey called it the “ best interview ” of her career.
“Have you left the country because of racism?” Winfrey asked the couple in the first clip that had not previously aired.
Prince Harry said “it was a big part of it,” recalling one event in particular.
“I remember Sentebale’s fundraising,” he said. ‘And one of the people at that dinner said to me,’ Please don’t do this to the media. They will destroy your life. “This person is friends with a lot of editors and all that. “
Harry continued, “I said, ‘Sorry, tell me what do you mean by that?’ So I knew. He said, “Please understand the UK is very intolerant.” And I stopped and said, “The UK is not intolerant. The British press is bigoted, especially the tabloids. Is that what you mean? ”
He says, ‘No, the UK is bigoted.’ And I said, “I don’t agree at all.” But unfortunately, if the source of information is inherently corrupt, racist, or biased, it filters out to the rest of society. ”
In the second clip, the Duke of Sussex spoke to Winfrey about how a trip to see Queen Elizabeth II was suddenly called off after a letter to Buckingham Palace in early 2020 telling the Royal Family they would be relinquishing their formal duties. .
“ That announcement we released on January 8, 2020, that is – the contents of it were posted in a letter to the institution, to my father, which was then shared in late December while we were in Canada, ” said Prince Harry . “And then come back on the 6th after my grandmother said, ‘Come the moment you land’.”
Meghan said she and Harry had asked if they could go to the monarch.
According to Harry, the Queen said, “Yes, come to Sandringham. I like a chat. Come for tea. Why don’t you stay for dinner? It’s going to be a long drive and you’ll be exhausted.”
“She wanted us to stay the night,” added Meghan.
The prince said they would “love that” until he received a message from his private secretary “as we landed in the UK”.
“Private secretary is kind of a CEO role within the institution,” said Meghan.
Harry said his then private secretary Fiona was “in fact cutting and pasting a message from the Queen’s private secretary.”
Please inform the Duke and Duchess of Sussex that he cannot come to Norfolk. The queen is busy. She’s been busy all week, ”he said in the letter read.
He continued, “She had just invited me. The queen is busy. She’s busy all week. Don’t come up here. ‘
Harry said he called his grandmother that night from Frogmore Cottage, where the couple lived before Archie was born. He asked her if she could come anyway, but he heard she was busy.
And she said, ‘Yes, I have something in my journal that I didn’t know I had.’ And I said, “Well, what about the rest of the week?” She says, “Well, that’s busy now too.”
He said he didn’t want to push, “because I kind of knew what was going on.”
“Isn’t the queen allowed to do what the queen wants to do?” Winfrey asked.
Harry said no.
“If you’re head of the firm, there are people around you who will give you advice,” he said. “And what also made me very sad is that some of that advice was very bad.”
In the two-hour special interview, Meghan and Harry discussed feeling alienated from the rest of the royal family, with Harry classifying his relationship with older brother William, Duke of Cambridge, as needing ‘space’.
The third clip shown by Winfrey on “CBS This Morning” shows the couple describing the environment in which Harry grew up, and how the royal family compared Meghan’s tabloid coverage to that of Kate, Duchess of Cambridge.
“You have had these conversations with your relatives. They know why you left, ”Winfrey said. Did anyone say, ‘I’m sorry you had to take that step’ or ‘I’m sorry you felt you had to because you didn’t think we were supporting you’? ‘
Harry said no one had.
“The feeling is that this was our decision, so the consequences are for us. And despite three years of asking for help and seeing or visualizing how this could end – it was, I don’t know, just – look, it’s very difficult Because I try. I am part of the system with them. I always have been. “
The prince said he was aware that his older brother, second in line to the throne, could not leave the system as he had.
Asked if Prince William wanted to leave the system, Harry said, “I don’t know. I can’t speak on his behalf.”
But with that relationship and that control and the fear of the British tabloids, it’s a really toxic environment. But I’ll always be there for him. I’ll always be there for my family. tried to help them see what happened, “Prince Harry said.
Winfrey asked if his family – his father Charles, for example – agreed that the environment was toxic.
“No, I think he should have made peace with it,” said Harry.
Meghan said she couldn’t make peace with it herself because the situation was different.
“I think what they – and this is why I would say, and I can’t speak for them either – if they can’t see this was different, then what happened to Kate when she was, you know,” said Meghan .
Winfrey asked if race was the difference.
“And social media,” replied Meghan. ‘That didn’t exist. And so it was like the wild, wild west. It spread like wildfire. And because I was American, it translated across the pond in a different way. So you had a noise level that was very different. But they cannot see that it is any different. “
“So you felt bullied internationally?” Winfrey asked.
Meghan said: “I think the volume of what was coming in and the interest was higher because of social media, because of the fact that I wasn’t just British, and that unfortunately when members of his family say, ‘Well this is what is happened to all of us “- if they can compare what the experience I went through was similar to what was shared with us.”
She used a nickname given to her sister-in-law before marrying William as an example.
“Kate’s name was ‘Waity Katie’, waiting to marry William, while I imagine it was very difficult, and I do. I can’t imagine what that felt like. This isn’t the same,” said Meghan.
She continued, “And if a member of his family will safely say that we’ve all dealt with things that are rude, rude, and racist, aren’t the same.”
The Duchess of Sussex claimed that the press team that would defend the royal family “if they know something is not true” did not defend them.
Winfrey asked Prince Harry if he hoped his family would ever recognize that the differences in treatment were too great.
“It would make a huge difference,” he said. “Like I said, there are a lot of people who have seen it for what it was … like it’s being talked about all over the world.”
The people who don’t want to see it, Harry claimed, “choose not to see it.”