ESCALATION

Meghan Markle Tells Oprah Winfrey She Wasn’t ‘Allowed’ to Make Her Own Choices as a Royal

A new clip from Oprah dropped on CBS Friday morning. In it, Meghan repeated her complaints that Buckingham Palace tried to strip her of agency and a voice.

Meghan Markle has said she was not allowed to make her own choices when she was a member of the royal family.

The comments were made in a new preview clip from Oprah Winfrey’s eagerly-awaited interview with Meghan Markle and Prince Harry, which dropped Friday morning on CBS This Morning.

In the new clip, Meghan said that she had not been “allowed” to give an interview before.

In the clip, Oprah told Meghan that she recalled calling her before her wedding and asking for an interview.

Meghan said, “I recall that conversation very well. I wasn’t even allowed to have that conversation with you personally. Right? There had to be people from the [communications team] sitting there…”

Oprah then said, “You turned me down nicely…What is right about this time?”

Meghan replied, “Well, so many things. That we are on the other side of a lot of life experience that’s happened. And also that we have the ability to make our own choices in a way that I couldn’t have said yes to you then. That wasn’t my choice to make. So, as an adult who lived a really independent life, to then go into this construct, that is, um, different, than I think what people imagine it to be, it’s really liberating to be able to have the right and the privilege in some ways to be able to say, ‘Yes, I am ready to talk.’ To say it for yourself... To be able to just make a choice on your own, to be able to speak for yourself.”

Meghan’s new comments appear to reiterate a frequent complaint of hers that she was denied her voice and agency when she was a member of the royal family.

The new clip came as tensions between Meghan and Harry and Buckingham Palace boiled over into all-out war, with reports in the British media suggesting multiple witnesses were ready to come forward and give evidence to a hastily-announced inquiry into alleged bullying by Meghan of her staff at Buckingham Palace.

Meghan’s friends responded to the bullying claims by launching a social media counterattack against Buckingham Palace today, calling her a “warm, kind, caring person.”

In a previous clip, Meghan accused the palace of “perpetuating falsehoods” about them.

An emotional Meghan said, “I don’t know how they could expect that after all of this time we would still just be silent if there is an active role that The Firm is playing in perpetuating falsehoods about us.”

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Tom SykesEuropean Editor at Large

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