Prince Harry and Meghan Markle skip King Charles III’s Trooping the Color

Prince Harry And Megan Markle didn’t make the trip across the pond to celebrate King Charles III‘s first Trooping the Color parade.

Charles, 74, celebrated his inaugural birthday parade on Saturday, June 17, with his wife Queen Camillaeldest son prince william and siblings Princess Anne And prince Edward. The king arrived on horseback for the occasion alongside the Prince of Wales, 40, and Anne, 72. The trio then joined the rest of the senior working royals – including William and Princess Kate‘s three children – on the balcony of Buckingham Palace to watch the military flypast.

However, the balcony appearance did not include Harry, 38, or Meghan, 41, who are no longer senior working royals since stepping down in 2020.

On Tuesday 13 June royal expert Gareth Russell predicted that the couple would not attend the celebration as they had resigned from their royal duties. (The Duke and Duchess of Sussex announced in January 2020 that they intended to step down from their senior royal positions and move to the United States the following July.)

“I don’t think they need to be invited,” said the Let’s have another drink! author exclusively told Us weekly earlier this month. “Not as an insult to them, but you know, it’s a long trip to make from California for the sake of Trooping the Color. … I think this is one of the events the Sussexes would never be invited to.

Despite the change in their royal status, Harry and Meghan attended Queen Elizabeth II’s final Trooping the Color in June 2022, which took place during the late monarch’s Platinum Jubilee. (The Queen died in September 2022 at the age of 96 after 70 years on the throne.)

The Archewell co-founders, along with their two children, watched the Horse Guards Parade from the Major General’s office, an area overlooking the parade grounds: Prince Archie, 4, and Princess Lilibet, 2. The family of four individuals could not watch the parade with other members of the Royal Family since Queen Elizabeth announced that only those “carrying out official public duties” on Her Majesty’s behalf would be allowed to take part in the balcony performance.

Since leaving, the pair have only returned to the UK a handful of times, including the Reserve the funeral of the author’s grandmother. Harry, for his part, traveled solo to attend his father’s historic coronation in April and to testify in his ongoing phone hacking trial against Mirror Group Newspapers which began a few weeks later. Despite the fact that the former military pilot is often in his home country, the trips were short-lived and there would have been no visit to his father, nor to his brother William.

Harry’s relationship with his family became strained after he released his 2023 memoir, Reserve. In the tell-all, the founder of Invictus Games described several arguments with William and His Majesty. In one instance, Harry claimed William started a physical fight after supposedly calling Meghan “difficult” and “rude.”

As Harry spoke out about his family feud, BetterUp’s CIO has spoken out about his desire to reconcile with his family, but told Anderson Cooper during a January 60 minutes interview that the “ball is very much in their court.”