Queen Elizabeth stayed in contact with Meghan Markle and Prince Harry after their 2020 royal exit.
April 14 2026, Published 12:36 p.m. ET
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The Sussexes’ Rift With the Royal Family Still Rages On
The Duke and Duchess of Sussex moved to California in 2020.
“She saw both of them, even after the estrangement,” the insider told a news outlet. “She also believed that you might have views, but you don’t have sides. She knew that families are complicated.”
When Meghan, 44, and Harry, 41, left the U.K. and headed to the West Coast to become “financially independent,” their rift with other members of the royal family, such as Prince William and King Charles, began to deepen.
While the Invictus Games founder and his father, 77, have made moves toward reconciliation, Harry’s beef with his elder brother, 43, hasn’t yet thawed.
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Queen Elizabeth died in 2022 at the age of 96.
“It’s very difficult. The only two people who can mend this are themselves. [The queen] could have been the convenor, but they have to take the first steps,” the queen’s former press secretary Ailsa Anderson also told People.
The sovereign died in September 2022 at the age of 96 after seven decades on the British throne. She would have turned 100 this year on April 21.
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Queen Elizabeth Was the ‘Glue’ of The Firm
The Sussexes are still feuding with Prince William and King Charles.
“Her greatness remains,” Elizabeth II: In Private. In Public. The Inside Story author Robert Hardman commented to the publication. “We tend to look at things through the prism of the present — particularly [ex-Prince] Andrew and Harry.”
“But when you stand back and look at a 70-year reign and a 96-year life, those are important chapters, not the defining elements. She came into a man’s world, held that institution together and handed it on in far better shape than people expected,” he continued.
“In moments of anguish, stress and crisis, she was the glue that kept us all together,” he said.
Ex-Prince Andrew Was Stripped of His Titles in October 2025
The former Prince Andrew was the queen’s favorite child.
The former Duke of York, 66, was the queen’s favorite child and is currently dealing with his own scandals.
Andrew Mountbatten-Windsor was arrested in February for allegedly sending Jeffrey Epstein private travel documents when he was the U.K.’s trade envoy from 2001 until 2011.
His name was mentioned many times in the Epstein files — with a plethora of his emails to the predator also being revealed.
The queen took away some of Andrew’s royal patronages and military honors in early 2022 before she passed. Charles then completely yanked away his younger brother’s full titles and his Windsor home, the Royal Lodge, last year.
