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Did Prince Harry and his wife Meghan, the Duchess of Sussex, have an inkling a “storm was coming” when they made the decision to relocate to the UK with their children in August 2026?
That was the question being asked by royal expert Rob Shuter on his Naughty But Nice substack on November 8, as a timeline of dramatic events caused a family mystery to deepen.
Meghan’s estranged father Thomas Markle Snr, 82, was granted release on bond under heavy monitoring on November 6, after being arrested in the States on child pornography charges. It is alleged he stashed child abuse material in two storage units in the Los Angeles area.
Markle Snr has not yet entered a plea but he has previously vehemently denied allegations against him, calling them “sick lies”.
It was his son, Thomas Markle Junior, who reported him to law enforcement, after allegedly finding child abuse material among his father’s belongings in his former home in the Phillipines.
Markle Junior reportedly contacted the FBI Hotline, the US-based National Center for Missing and Exploited Children and Pennsylvania police on July 10.
But after receiving no follow-up inquiries for weeks, he made the decision to check the remaining contents himself.
Meghan meanwhile – who has been estranged from her father for many years – said she was “deeply distressed” by the news, while acknowledging that claims against her father had been brought to her attention via a letter received in January 2019.
She said she had been assured at the time that the authorities were investigating the claims.
Meghan – who shares two children Archie, seven, and Lilibet, five, with Prince Harry – said she hoped it could “now be understood that, despite certain media publications’ distortion over the years, any distance from my father and my choice to not allow him to have contact with our children, was for one reason: to protect them”.
Now, entertainment journalist Shuter has claimed that friends of Harry and Meghan’s are “privately questioning whether the Sussexes’ dramatic return to Britain had less to do with family, schools or Harry’s homesickness – and more to do with the growing scandal surrounding Meghan’s father”.
With Markle Junior reportedly first reporting the alleged stash found in the Philippines in July, Shuter said the timeline was “raising eyebrows”.
That same month, Meghan and Harry took their children to visit King Charles for the first time since 2022. A month later, they were back for an extended stay.
“People are starting to wonder whether this move was really about starting a new life in Britain or getting out of California before the whole thing blew up,” a source told Shuter, adding that the timing was “difficult to ignore”.
Equally difficult to ignore is the apparent impact Harry and Meghan’s UK return has had on King Charles himself.
Charles was reportedly left “fairly stung” by a recent UK popularity poll in which he received the weakest result since taking the throne – and some believe Harry and Meghan are to blame.
“He really is caught between a rock and a hard place with this. He misses his son and wants to have a relationship with his grandchildren, but every time he makes a move towards reconciling, there’s all this backlash,” a source tells Woman’s Day.
“His courtiers are warning him that the Sussexes are only going to drag him down further… if he allows them to come back into the fold.
“It doesn’t help that Harry and Meghan are going around doing these quasi-royal engagements, that’s just making it all worse. Now there’s this whole mess involving Meghan’s family and all these accusations about a palace cover-up.
“Charles certainly doesn’t blame Harry and Meghan for that. He genuinely feels terrible about what they’re going through, but there’s no denying that this is another headache he doesn’t need.”
As a result, Charles is said to be keeping the Sussexes at arms length – with no Christmas invite on the cards due to the “absolute uproar within the family” it would cause.
“He just can’t face it,” a source tells Woman’s Day. “He’s just so tired of all the drama, all he wants is some peace.”
But speaking on the Palace Confidential podcast, royal expert Richard Eden suggested Charles’ inaction was precisely the reason for his plummeting popularity.
“I’m sorry, I know this might not be a popular thing to say in some quarters, but I think [Harry and Meghan] have damaged his reputation,” Eden said.
“That’s because he hasn’t dealt with the issue. He’s seemingly welcomed them back, and they are not popular.
“In my opinion, his popularity would be boosted if he took action to strip Harry and Meghan of their titles.”
