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Meghan Markle’s friend Omid Scobie claimed her mind is ‘very much on the situation here’ and that she is grieving because ‘she has also lost a family member’ as he led coverage on ABC on Prince Philip’s funeral on Saturday.
Meghan is pregnant and in California. She did not join Harry for his grandfather’s funeral, which comes a month after she trashed the royal family during an interview with Oprah.
Scobie, her friend who wrote the book Finding Freedom, was on ABC as a correspondent. He is in London.
Meghan’s other American media ally, Gayle King, led coverage of the funeral for CBS from the network’s Manhattan studio.
He said: ‘Although Meghan isn’t here, she is of course supporting Harry….her mind is very much on the situation over here.’
He then went on: ‘We know that she’s supporting Harry in this very difficult week for him, but she’ll also be sad because this is also the loss of a family member for her.
‘She grew very close to the queen and Prince Philip over the recent years. It was probably her strongest relationship within the family and those relations then get smaller this week.
‘It’ll be a sad day for her.’
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Meghan Markle’s friend Omid Scobie claimed her mind is ‘very much on the situation here’ and that she is grieving because ‘she has also lost a family member’ as he led coverage on ABC on Prince Philip’s funeral on Saturday
Gayle King, another of Meghan’s friend’, led CBS’s coverage.
She made no mention of the devastating Oprah interview her own network aired while Philip was in the hospital, but said she suspects ‘family differences will be set aside for the day’.
‘William and Harry, there’s no secret about this, have had a strained relationship you could say since Harry stepped away from his royal duties.’
She then, during a talk-back- former Vanity Fair editor Tina Brown, said there was ‘family drama’ that the world was speculating over.
‘Are we reading too much into the body language? They didn’t stand shoulder to shoulder when their mother was buried. This was by the Queen’s design,’ she said.
Harry and William walked behind the custom Defender Land Rover that was carrying their grandfather’s body but were several feet apart.
King said Harry had been in quarantine until ‘this morning’ after flying to the UK without his pregnant wife Meghan.
‘A lot has been made…at the end of the day, this is a family that’s grieving. I would suspect all of the family differences would be set aside for the day,’ she said.
She was slammed by viewers who told her to ‘show some respect’. Some fumed that she had been chosen to anchor the special report after the Oprah interview.
She also led coverage of Prince Philip’s death last week, and the network devoted three packages to it on their morning show, but none of them mentioned Meghan, Prince Harry, or the allegations of racism they made against his family in the interview.
CBS host Gayle King was in the network’s Manhattan studio and said she suspects the family differences will be ‘set aside for the day’
Viewers disapproved of Gayle King’s coverage, calling it ‘disrespectful’
King is best friends with Oprah, visited Meghan at Windsor and attended her baby shower.
She no doubt had a hand in the orchestrating of the interview that sent shockwaves around the world and ripped through the Royal Family at a time when Prince Philip was gravely ill in hospital.
King and her CBS cohosts not only promoted the interview extensively, but they also dissected it once it had aired and said Meghan had been ‘vilified’ and ‘oppressed’.
Scobie announced Harry’s personal tribute to Philip earlier this week, which called him ‘a legend of banter’, and has claimed the funeral will be the ‘first steps’ to him mending his relationship with William.
Royal aides are ‘walking on eggshells’ as they try to navigate the rift, sources say.
King recently claimed that the Duke and Duchess of Sussex had a deal with CBS and ITV to postpone their bombshell interview with Oprah Winfrey if Prince Philip had died.
Neither Gayle nor Omid made any mention of the devastating interview Harry and Meghan gave to Oprah
She had already sparked a row after revealing that the Sussexes told her that they had held talks with Harry’s brother Prince William and father Charles which ‘were not productive’.
Scobie is also known to be friends with Meghan, and last month published an email in which she demanded aides release a statement claiming Kate drove her to tears at a bridesmaid dress fitting.
It emerged on Thursday that William and Harry would not stand shoulder to shoulder behind their grandfather’s coffin. Instead, they will be either side of their cousin, Peter Phillips.
Insiders stressed that the arrangement should not be taken as a sign that the brothers refused to walk alongside each other.
A Buckingham Palace spokesman said: ‘This is a funeral… we will not be drawn into those perceptions of drama. The arrangements have been agreed and they reflect Her Majesty’s wishes.’
Sources did admit, however, that the fraternal feud has taken up ‘much thought and energy’ in the Lord Chamberlain’s Office, which is responsible for today’s arrangements.
‘Everyone is walking on eggshells so as not to exacerbate the situation,’ said one.
‘To be fair, both William and Harry have made clear that they wish to focus on mourning their grandfather and do not want anything to get in the way of that.
‘But it has made everyone doubly nervous about saying anything that could be remotely construed of being critical of the other side. It’s been a minefield.’
Sources insist the formation of those walking behind the coffin was based on ‘bloodlines and age’.
Prince Philip will be laid to rest at a ceremony at Windsor Castle today
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