Daniela Elser: Prince Harry broke Queen's golden rule with US election comments

During her 68-year reign, the Queen has worked with 14 Prime Ministers. Every week, she has dutifully held weekly audiences with each of them without fail, which amounts to 3536 meetings.

The mind boggles pondering the immense questions of state, national security secrets and the number of cups of tepid tea that have been shared between Her Majesty and the various men and women who have held the top job over the years.

And she has not voted for a single one of them.

The Queen might know how to change a spark plug, breed champion racehorses and speak fluent French, but on her staggeringly long list of achievements, exercising the very basic democratic right of nipping along to the election booth every few years is simply not one of them.

Her Majesty might be a committed Tory or a devout Labourite, complete with a cherished 'Tony Blair 4 eva' poster in her guest loo, but we the nosy public will never, ever know.

Nor will we ever know how she feels about Brexit, Scotland's niggling bids for independence, Boris Johnson's handling of the Covid crisis or Amber and Greg winning last year's Love Island.

The same cannot be said for her grandson Prince Harry who this week hit the headlines after wading into the roiling waters of the US presidential election. Speaking in a prerecorded clip during the broadcast to celebrate the Time100 list, the royal said: "This election, I'm not going to be able to vote here in the US.

"But many of you may not know that I haven't been able to vote in the UK my entire life.

"As we approach this November, it's vital that we reject hate speech, misinformation and online negativity."

(A quick note: There is nothing constitutionally that would stop Harry from voting in the UK, rather members of the royal family conventionally abstain from voting given the Queen is the official head of state.)

Sure, Prince Harry and Meghan Markle were not exactly wearing "Vote Biden" T-shirts, but their anti-Trump stance seemed pretty obvious.

Meghan has regularly appeared at online events over the past few months encouraging women to vote in the upcoming White House race, Harry's comments are the first time the Brit has strayed into distinctly political, and thus treacherous, waters, in a move the UK media has variously described as "crossing the line", a "diplomatic incident" and "a problem".

When President Trump visited Buckingham Palace Harry appeared to skulk in the background. Photo / Getty Images

To be fair, the Sussexes' views on who they want to win in November are hardly difficult to discern. Last June when Donald Trump visited the UK, Harry skulked around at the back of the gaggle of Windsors who greeted him, giving the impression he did not want to be in the same city, let alone in the same faux cheery press snap, as the tangerine former reality star.

Meghan in her former civilian life pre-Harry, called Trump "misogynistic" and "divisive".

That distaste would seem to be mutual. On Thursday, Trump told reporters at a White House press briefing, "I'm not a fan of hers. I would say this – and she probably has heard that – I wish a lot of luck to Harry, because he's going to need it."

However there is a Grand Canyon-sized chasm between trying to avoid standing too close to a man who infamously bragged about grabbing women by the genitals and throwing oneself smackbang into the middle of the political fray.

Keep in mind, these were not off-the-cuff remarks or the sixth-in-line to the throne being caught on camera in an unguarded moment of honesty. Given this, Harry (and Meghan) had to be aware that by making such a public departure from staying resolutely mum on politics would amount to a very clear crossing of a long established royal line.

On Thursday, Buckingham Palace took the unusual step of putting out a statement distancing themselves from the California-based couple, a move the Telegraph termed "a significant public intervention".

"The Duke is not a working member of the royal family and any comments he makes are made in a personal capacity," a royal spokesman said proving once and for all that the monarchy's media flunkies are not paid by the word.

On some level, there is a certain inevitability to this turn of events. Harry and Meghan have regularly shown a (perhaps healthy) disregard for convention when it comes to charting their own course.

Factor in also, their arrival in the US has coincided with a seismic moment in the fight to address systemic racism and during a time when the country is riven by rancorous political division.

Given this, and Harry and Meghan's outspokenness and commitment to using their platform, and it is nigh on impossible they were ever going to stay politely schtum while tending to their new koi pond.

That, however, is probably cold comfort for those left behind in London to deal with the fallout. In January, Buckingham Palace put out a statement saying "the Sussexes have made clear that everything they do will continue to uphold the values of Her Majesty".

Given that one of the nonagenarian monarch's most notable characteristics is her sphinxlike inscrutability, Harry and Meghan's forthright approach to public life stands in direct, voluble contrast.

Speaking to the Times, a former royal adviser has cast a picture of a palace fretting over this turn of events and what they might portent for the future.

"The political arena is very sensitive for all members of the royal family. You cannot have an apolitical institution, which is what a hereditary monarchy is, and have members of the royal family making even slightly political comments," the adviser has said.

Prince Harry and Meghan Markle weighed into the US election this week and Harry's comments left the palace scrambling to release a statement. Photo / YouTube

"Courtiers would be concerned that we have not even got into the heat of the election campaign. If they have made these comments now, what might happen between now and election day?

"Courtiers would be extremely concerned that if they are going to continue to comment on what could be the most contentious US presidential election in living memory, how difficult could that get?"

On one level, it is truly impressive the Duke is refusing to stay politely mute while one of the world's most powerful nations teeters on a knife's edge.

However, Harry is not some Hollywood A-lister who has just gotten a taste for part-time activism. The Sussexes might technically no longer represent the Queen, freed from the confines of palace life to churn out worthy docos for Netflix by the bucketful, but it would be wilfully naive to think they are perceived private citizens.

No matter that they have put 8000-odd kilometres between themselves and Windsor Castle, everything they say and do reflects directly on the royal family and every project, speech and public engagement they take on now and in the future will be interpreted through the lens of them being the Duke and Duchess of Sussex.

What is so interesting is the Sussexes had to have known what sort of reaction that Harry's Time declaration would unleash and evidently went ahead anyway. (In late August, a poll done by YouGov found that 49 per cent of Brits thought it was "not appropriate" for members of the royal family to discuss politics publicly.)

In the Sussexes' decision to so very publicly deviate from tradition, it is hard not to read something of a blunt rejection of the royal status quo.

Friday this week marked 200 days exactly since the couple strode out of Westminster Abbey after the Commonwealth Day service on March 9 to start their new lives. If anyone had thought they would be quietly waltzing off into the sunset to make green smoothies à deux and add to their collection of rescue dogs would be sorely mistaken.

However, this week's events point to the Duke and Duchess taking an increasingly outspoken stance perhaps sooner than expected.

It seems unlikely that, in the face of a harrumphing British media, that the duo are likely to dramatically change course. The former royal adviser who spoke to the Times also said the royal family "know that Meghan and Harry intend to be more public".

The challenge for the HRHs-turned-novice filmmakers is, how to balance the moral imperative of this historic moment without burning bridges back home in Blighty. Or in other words, how do they stay true to who they are without being seen as flagrantly rejecting the example set by the Queen?

Like pretty much everything about 2020, there are no easy answers here, for Harry and Meghan and for the palace.