By Molly Claire Goddard
11:44am PST, Jan 15, 2026
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According to royal expert
Jasmine Carey,
Prince Harry's decision to step back from The Firm wasn't his worst. "Yes, leaving the royal family and setting up home in California was something that Harry did, which didn't please members of the public in the U.K.," she wrote for
Daily Express. "But it wasn't the worst thing. If he had just done this, we would probably have all moved on. But the point is, he didn't. Instead, he packed his bags, set up a new life in America and went about his new ambition to earn his own money… by dragging his royal relatives through the mud [not literally, of course]."
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Meghan Markle and
Prince Harry first spoke out against the royal family during a 2021
interview with
Oprah Winfrey. "My father [
King Charles III] and my brother [
Prince William], they are trapped," the Duke of Sussex said. "It's a very trapping environment that a lot of them are stuck in."
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In
Prince Harry's 2023 memoir,
Spare, he opened up about his bitter feud with Prince William. "In some ways he was my mirror, in some ways he was my opposite," the father of two wrote. "My beloved brother, my archnemesis, how had that happened?"
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In 2020,
Prince Harry and Meghan Markle announced that they were leaving England. "We intend to step back as 'senior' members of the royal family and work to become financially independent, while continuing to fully support Her Majesty
Queen Elizabeth II. It is with your encouragement, particularly over the last few years, that we feel prepared to make this adjustment," the statement shared to Instagram via
Daily Express read.
