Meghan Markle was once celebrated as a refreshing change for Britain’s traditional royal family, but the initial admiration has long faded.
The Duke and Duchess of Sussex stepped down from their roles as senior royals in 2020 and relocated to California. Now, Meghan is preparing for a major return to public life.
Reports suggest that the mother of two is set to launch her Netflix series and lifestyle brand in 2025. However, after the couple publicly shared their grievances and Meghan, now 43, faced allegations of bullying from palace staff, a royal expert has expressed doubt that she will ever be warmly welcomed back in the UK.
“I don’t think Meghan will ever win over the U.K. public again,” Ingrid Seward, editor-in-chief of Majesty magazine and author of My Mother and I, shared with Fox News Digital.
“Things change very quickly, but I cannot see it happening,” Seward emphasized. “Not in this generation. Maybe there’s a younger generation that Meghan might win over. I know she probably appeals to younger rather than older people.”
“Everyone agrees that Meghan is a gorgeous-looking girl and very stylish… but it doesn’t mean that you like her,” Seward added. “I just think at the moment, people in the U.K. simply don’t like her.”
The Duke and Duchess of Sussex have been estranged from the royal family ever since stepping back from their official roles. According to the couple, the decision was driven by unbearable media intrusion and the racist undertones of some British press coverage.
After relocating to California, the pair participated in a highly publicized interview with Oprah Winfrey, which drew an audience of nearly 50 million globally. They also starred in a Netflix docuseries, and Prince Harry published a bestselling memoir, Spare, detailing his challenges with royal life.
Shortly before their interview with Winfrey aired, The Times of London published a report alleging that Meghan had driven away two personal assistants and that staff had been “humiliated” during her time at Kensington Palace.
Meghan’s legal team denied the accusations. At the time, her spokesperson described the claims as the “latest attack on her character.”
Between the controversies and their struggles with royal life in the public eye, their popularity in the U.K. has drastically declined.
“I think sadly in the U.K. they are really not liked, especially Meghan,” Seward shared. “People see her as a girl [who] took her husband away from his family, and she’s a girl [who] abandoned her own family. Not all of it, obviously not, but her father. And now, she’s persuaded Harry to abandon his father, and he dissed his own family in his autobiography. He didn’t have to do that.”
Seward went on to say, “I think people really have a very, very low opinion of the Sussexes. I think there is a big fondness for Harry still. I think people feel that he’s totally manipulated by his wife, which we don’t know, but I think people feel that.”
“At the moment, people are just not interested in them here, but they’re interested in reading about their demise… They’re not interested in perhaps reading about how well they might be doing. We never hear if they’re doing well because we only hear about the bad things they do.”
“People are fickle, and it could all change,” Seward added.
In June 2023, Buckingham Palace revealed it had conducted an investigation into how staff managed allegations of bullying.
Palace officials stated that the findings from the independent review would remain confidential to protect the identities of those involved. As a result of the review, the palace announced updates to its human resources policy but declined to specify the nature of the changes.
This was not the first time Meghan faced intense scrutiny from the British media.
When Harry, now 40, started dating Meghan, the former Suits actress was criticized by U.K. tabloids for seemingly trivial matters, from eating avocados to wearing dark nail polish. Nevertheless, some observers noted that Meghan was far from the first royal to endure harsh treatment from the press.
