Donald Trump has intensified his criticism of Prince Harry and Meghan Markle, claiming the couple treated Prince William “very terribly” and saying he would “never speak to them again” if he were in the Royal Family’s position.
The US President also appeared to place much of the blame for the Sussexes’ royal fallout on Meghan, suggesting the Duchess of Sussex had been a “horrible” influence on her British husband.
His latest remarks came just a day after he said he “wouldn’t have taken them back” in response to Harry and Meghan’s unexpected return to the UK.
In an interview with GB News presenter Bev Turner, Trump argued that the Duke and Duchess of Sussex had caused too much damage and done “too many horrible things” to be embraced again without consequences.
Trump said King Charles’s recent meeting with Harry and Meghan proved the monarch was “a much better person than I am,” adding that he would have handled the situation very differently.
“I wouldn’t have done it. I would have said forget it,” he said.
“Personally, I would not have taken them back. Too much hate, too many really bad things.”
Harry and Meghan have returned to Britain after six years away, with Trump saying he was “happy” the couple had left the United States.
He said: ‘First of all, I think King Charles is fantastic, he’s a friend of mine. He [Prince Harry] wrote a book that was so bad, and she was a horrible influence on him. What she’s done to him is unacceptable.’
Mr Trump argued that the way the couple treated Harry’s brother, Prince William, was also ‘terrible’.
He said: ‘But I think that what she [Meghan] has done and him [Prince Harry], he wrote a book that was very terrible to William, it was terrible.
‘The things he said, I wouldn’t… I mean, it’s just me. I’m sure I’m wrong on this, but I would not have taken him back. I would have never spoken to him again.’
Donald Trump has said that he ‘wouldn’t have taken Prince Harry and Meghan Markle back’ and suggested Prince William is right to ‘never speak to them again’
The President said Harry and Meghan had been guilty of ‘too much hate, too many really bad things’
He said the Sussexes, and particularly Harry, had been ‘very terrible’ to Prince William
Bev suggested that, although there appears to be ‘no relationship’ between Prince Harry and Prince William, the King appears to have ‘offered an olive branch’ to his son and daughter-in-law.
Mr Trump responded: ‘It shows you what a good man King Charles is. He’s a much better person than I am. I wouldn’t have done it. I would have said forget it.’
Bev then joked: ‘But your children probably wouldn’t have done what Harry did to his father, the relationship is different.’
Mr Trump laughed, telling Bev: ‘Well, I hope not!’
Heaping further praise on the King, the US President reflected on the monarch’s recent visit to America and how ‘everybody loved him’.
He told Bev: ‘If I were King Charles, I would not take them back. There’s too much. He was here a couple of months ago, everybody loved him in America. He spoke in front of Congress, everybody loved him. He’s a fantastic guy.
‘And he’s been a friend of mine for a long time. I knew him as Prince Charles, I know him as King Charles, and he’s amazing and he’s fighting through a very tough situation with his health, and very few people would have that bravery to do what he’s done.’
The US President had previously addressed Prince Harry and Meghan Markle’s US exit during a meeting with travel executives in the Oval Office at the White House on Wednesday evening.
When asked about the Sussexes deciding to return to the UK, Mr Trump said: ‘I’m happy about it. I was not a fan. I had a very good relationship with the Queen, really good. I got to know her very well.
‘[I have] a really good relationship with King Charles. I know him as Prince Charles; I’ve known him for a long time.
‘He’s a great guy, and I thought they [Meghan and Harry] treated the Royal Family with great disrespect. I didn’t like the way she acted.
‘I thought she was terribly disrespectful to the Queen, to King Charles. Maybe I’m different; I would not have taken them back.’
Prince Harry, Prince Archie, Princess Lilibet and Meghan, Duchess of Sussex, in a family photo released in December last year . They are back in the UK
Prince Harry and his then-fiancee, Meghan Markle, pose for a photograph in the Sunken Garden at Kensington Palace in 2017
President Donald Trump had earlier cheered the news of Prince Harry and Meghan Markle’s surprise return to the UK.
Speaking of the Sussexes’ decision to leave their home in Montecito and move back to Britain, Trump said: ‘I’m happy about it.’
‘I was not a fan,’ he added, noting that he had a ‘very good relationship with the Queen and with [King] Charles’.
‘I thought they treated the Royal Family with great disrespect. I didn’t like it,’ Trump told reporters of Harry and Meghan. ‘I didn’t like the way she acted.’
‘I thought she was terribly disrespectful to the Queen, to King Charles,’ Trump said of Meghan’s behaviour and the couple’s decision to step back from their royal duties six years ago.
Harry and Meghan told King Charles last month that they would be moving back to Britain with their children, Archie, seven, and Lilibet, five, who are slated to begin school there this week.
The Sussexes are now staying in the UK for an ‘extended period’ after flying into the country on August 26.
The family is said to be eyeing a home in the Cotswolds.
While the couple appeared to be leading a quiet, private life in Montecito, California, the pair had made no secret of their disillusionment with the current administration.
And with the November midterm elections fast approaching, concerns about the direction of the US have been top-of-mind, People magazine first reported.
Their return to Britain was cheered by some in Trump’s orbit, who mocked the news following reports that the decision was motivated in part by their views of the current president.
Katie Miller, the wife of White House deputy chief of staff Stephen Miller, shared a report about their move on social media, noting: ‘They are moving back to Britain because they don’t like President Trump.’
Conservative personality Megyn Kelly also responded to their move and their decision to step down as senior members of the working family six years ago – a decision many dubbed ‘Megxit.’
‘We’ve done our time here in America my dear friend!’ Kelly said on X, replying to Right-wing commentator Dan Wootton’s post about Megxit being ‘reversed.’
The family is not severing their California ties for good, however. They plan to keep their home in Montecito, as well as a separate vacation property they own in Portugal.
King Charles and Trump share a laugh at the White House state dinner in April 2026. The monarch filled his speech with jokes – including about the Boston Tea Party
Trump previously said he and the late Queen Elizabeth II had an ‘incredible’ relationship
‘What is absolutely crucial is that Harry never fell out of love with Britain – he fell out of love with the circumstances he found himself living in, and those are very different things,’ Harry’s friend Alex Rayner, who went with him on a charity trek to the North Pole in 2011, and remains in regular contact with him, told Our News Outlet of their return.
Others spoke of ‘an increasing and significant shift in sentiment, a feeling the American dream might not be all it was cracked up to be.’
That sentiment does not appear to be one-sided, either. ‘This is coming from Meghan as well as from him,’ a friend told Our News Outlet. ‘I hear that Meghan is all for rekindling with and reconnecting with Harry’s English side. She is fully behind it.’
President Trump and King Charles indeed appear to share a warm relationship.
Their camaraderie was on full display in April, when Trump hosted Charles and Queen Camilla at the White House for the first state dinner of his second term – and to celebrate the country’s 250th birthday.
Both Trump and the King made comments about their countries’ shared backstories, with Charles calling the fete a ‘very considerable improvement on the Boston Tea Party.’
The King also called attention to the president’s ‘readjustments’ to the East Wing, which is no longer standing.
‘I’m sorry to say that we British, of course, made our own small attempt at real estate redevelopment of the White House in 1814,’ the King joked.
