Royal expert Lady Colin Campbell shocks Today hosts with comments about Meghan Markle and Harry

Lady Colin Campbell today accused Meghan Markle of ‘playing the race card to get a free pass to behave badly’ and claimed Prince Harry ‘would never have married her if she was white’ in a fiery tirade on Australian TV. 

The Jamaican-born British socialite, 71, appeared on the Today show on Good Friday, hours after dropping bombshell allegations that Princess Anne was the senior royal who made comments about Archie’s skin colour. 

The Sussexes claimed a relative of Harry’s said there were ‘concerns and conversations about how dark his skin might be when he’s born’. 

But the couple refused to name the alleged culprit in an interview watched by more than 50 million people worldwide, saying it would be too damaging to the person they were accusing of racism. Lady C claims it was Princess Anne. 

In a morning show interview on Friday, she claimed Princess Anne ‘wasn’t alluding to the colour of this child’ but rather Meghan’s ‘unsuitable’ character’ and alleged ‘constant use of the race card’. 

‘Meghan weaponises colour with everything,’ Lady Campbell told the Today programme. 

‘You see, as long as she plays the colour card, she gets a free pass to behave as badly and as freely as she would like.

‘She has no boundaries and as long as she plays the colour card, it is open season.’

Lady Campbell said that Meghan’s colour ‘was the one thing that she had going in her favour’.

‘Had Meghan been white, there is no way that marriage would have proceeded, because Meghan’s past was rather too chequered, and Meghan’s personality was very abrasive,’ she said.

‘The one thing that Meghan had going in her favour was that she was mixed race.’

Today host Leila McKinnon then asked Lady Campbell if she believed Meghan had a hard time with the press.

‘She was absolutely attacked,’ McKinnon said.

Lady Campbell replied: ‘Meghan was attacked the way everybody else is attacked  who is in the public eye in Britain.’ 

‘Meghan had a very easy ride of it, but Meghan is a born complainer, and a drama queen.’

McKinnon said it appeared Lady Campbell had a ‘case of the Piers Morgans here’, 

She was refering to the long-time critic of Meghan who last month quit Good Morning Britain after an argument over whether her claims in the Oprah interview should be believed.

‘Is your intense dislike for any reason? Have you met Meghan?’ McKinnon questioned. 

Lady Campbell replied: ‘I’ve not met Meghan and I don’t want to meet Meghan,’ she said. 

‘If you are a proper biographer, you don’t have to meet the subject of your biography.’

McKinnon disagreed, replying: ‘Well, my dear, maybe if you haven’t met Meghan, you perhaps don’t know exactly what she is like and you are just hearing what you are hearing from sources with their own agendas?’ 

The Today hosts also asked Lady Campbell whether Princess Anne had spoken to the couple.

She replied: ‘My understanding is that nobody in the Royal Family is very pleased with the fact that any time they say anything to Harry, it ends up on American television via one of Oprah’s friends. 

‘So, you know, put your self in the shoes of the Royal Family. 

‘Any family does not want its dirty linen washed in public. Nor do they want to be unfairly accused of prejudices that they do not have because an ambitious girl has married into the family.’

Lady Campbell earlier claimed that Princess Anne was the royal accused of racism – but insisted the Queen’s daughter was completely misunderstood by the Sussexes.

She said: ‘Harry decided that on the slimmest of hints about culture – that it referred to colour.

‘She [Anne] had concerns about the disastrous effects of allowing somebody of that ilk, character wise, into the family, would not only cause trouble for all of them but also for any child born of the union’.

Lady C added: ‘Harry ran to Meghan with the objections, Meghan weaponised them on the grounds of colour. We are looking at people who are very eager to spot a slight where doubtless none exist’.

Buckingham Palace has declined to comment on the claims. MailOnline also approached the Sussexes for comment. 

The Sussexes also suggested that they tried to deprive Archie of a title and security because he was of mixed race. 

But on Thursday, Lady Colin has told her own podcast, ‘Chatting with Lady C’, that they were pointing the finger at Princess Anne, unfairly, and it was a misunderstanding in a discussion about the cultural differences between Brits and American.

Citing a royal insider, she said: ‘There were no concerns about Meghan’s colour. Princess Anne was rightly concerned that if the marriage proceeded and there were children there would be huge problems, not because of Meghan’s colour, but because of Meghan’s inability and determination to remain unable to appreciate the cultural differences’.  

She added that Anne was concerned that Meghan may not ‘actually have respect for the institution in to which she was marrying, and the family in which she was marrying’.  

‘Meghan and Harry have used that genuine concern of a loving aunt, knowing that because she is down to earth, experienced, modest, intelligent and sensible, and that you cannot make a sow’s ear into a silk purse. 

‘Nobody is the guilty party in terms of racism. But Princess Anne was the champion in terms of ‘don’t marry that girl, she is unsuitable. She is wrong for the country, wrong for the job. Well, it’s turned out to be true.

‘I think it’s important that it is out there before it is weaponised by some anti-establishment, anti-monarchist organisation, who will spin things destructively to further their agenda.

‘I think there is a time to get in the first blow. I’ve met Princess Anne a few times, but we’re not friends’.  

Previously the Queen responded to the Sussexes’ interview with a deeply personal message saying that while ‘some recollections vary’, the issues raised, particularly that of race, were ‘concerning’ and would be taken seriously.

Significantly, however, she emphasised that from now on their difficulties should be addressed by the family privately.

The couple made several explosive claims of racism within the Royal Family during the interview. 

Oprah Winfrey asked whether there were concerns her child would be ‘too brown’ and that would be a problem. Meghan replied: ‘If that is the assumption you are making, that is a pretty safe one.’

Harry complained none of his relatives spoke out in support of Meghan after stories he claimed had ‘colonial undertones’ were published.

‘No-one from my family ever said anything over those three years. That hurts,’ he said.

The Duke added of the Press: ‘Unfortunately, if the source of information is inherently corrupt or racist or biased then that filters out to the rest of society.’

In an extra clip that did not make the final two-hour cut, Oprah asks Harry if they left the UK because of racism to which he replied: ‘It was a large part of it.’

In more additional footage, Meghan said her treatment in the Press had been worse than Kate’s, saying: ‘If a member of his family would comfortably say “we’ve all had to deal with things that are rude”, rude and racist are not the same.’   

Royal warfare erupted after Harry and Meghan revealed deeply private and confidential conversations with the royal family to a US journalist friend after they appeared on Oprah, despite claiming it would be their ‘final word’ on their rift with the royals.

The couple told breakfast show host Gayle King the prince had finally spoken to his father and brother – and she went on a major TV network to disclose that the talks ‘were not productive’.

Miss King also suggested that Meghan was unhappy that no-one in the Royal Family had picked up the phone to her yet following their explosive interview with Oprah Winfrey.

And in a thinly-veiled threat, the broadcaster said Meghan had made clear she has ‘documents to back up everything she said on Oprah’s interview’.

The fact that the couple chose to discuss such sensitive discussions between senior members of the royal family with a TV journalist, who broadcast them blow-by-blow within hours, met with an icy response from Buckingham Palace. 

Prince William has insisted that the Royal Family were not racists after Meghan claimed one of them had raised ‘concerns’ about ‘how dark’ her baby’s skin would be, and suggested that they tried to deprive Archie of a title and security because he was of mixed race.

She also claimed she had been given so little support by the palace that she suffered suicidal thoughts.

For his part, Harry said he felt ‘really let down’ by his father, accused him of cutting him off financially and refusing to take his calls, while revealing there was a gulf between himself and William. 

In recent days there have been a handful of stories published in the UK reporting that Charles and William felt hurt by what Harry had said, but with very little detail on what was taking place behind the scenes.

That was turned on its head when Miss King, who attended Meghan’s lavish baby shower in New York in 2019 and is Miss Winfrey’s closest friend, decided to speak out on her prime time morning show on CBS, the same channel that broadcast the Sussexes’ interview.

Harry was accused of ‘embarrassing’ hypocrisy this week for speaking to CBS, which caused outrage in 2004 by showing a photograph of his mother dying in a 1997 car crash in Paris.

Miss King told viewers she had called Harry and Meghan at their £10 million California home ‘over the weekend’ to discuss the fall-out from the interview and revealed that they had told her details of their intimate conversations.

She said: ‘Well I’m not trying to break news, but I did actually call them to see how they were feeling, and it’s true, Harry has talked to his brother and he has talked to his father too.

‘The word I was given was that those conversations were not productive. But they are glad that they have at least started a conversation.’

Miss King also claimed that the couple were unhappy that ‘the palace’ had apparently been leaking what they believed were untrue stories to the media, adding: ‘And I think what is still upsetting to them is the palace keep saying they want to work it out privately, but yet, they believe these false stories are coming out that are very disparaging against Meghan, still.’

She made clear that the Duchess was unhappy that no-one in the family had called her, despite her making a string of highly inflammatory allegations against several of them in her interview and revealing details of what had been a private conversation between her husband and a family member in which it was alleged an offensive comment had been made.

‘No one in the Royal Family has talked to Meghan yet, at this particular time,’ she said.

The Sussexes effectively accused the Royal Family and Buckingham Palace of institutional racism in their interview with Miss Winfrey.

But Miss King claimed they felt ‘frustrated’ that much of the coverage had focused on this – when they had apparently only wanted to provoke the monarchy into taking action against the media, which they believe has a racist agenda against Meghan.

‘I think it’s frustrating for them to see that it’s a racial conversation about the Royal Family when all they wanted all along was for the royals to intervene and tell the Press to stop with the unfair, inaccurate, false stories that definitely have a racial slant,’ Miss King said.

‘And until you can acknowledge that, I think it’s going to be hard to move forward. But they both want to move forward with this and they both want healing in this family. At the end of the day, that is Harry’s family.’

The broadcaster also raised the investigation launched earlier this month by Buckingham Palace into how claims of bullying against Meghan lodged by a senior member of palace staff were handled.

Her former communications secretary, Jason Knauf, complained in 2018 that she had driven out two PAs with her behaviour and was targeting other female members of staff, but nothing was apparently ever done in response to his allegations.

Miss King says: ‘The bullying thing was raised in 2018 and now there’s an ongoing investigation about bullying from Meghan Markle, when anyone who has worked with her will tell you exactly who she is. You know, she’s really a very sweet, caring person.’

She added: ‘And as I say, Meghan has documents to back up everything that she said on Oprah’s interview. Everything.’

In a further discussion about the ongoing family strife and how to resolve it, Miss King seemed to suggest that Harry and Meghan were not satisfied by Buckingham Palace’s response to their bombshell interview and the claims in it.

She said: ‘The family has to acknowledge that there are issues. And right now, no-one has acknowledged, “Houston, we have a problem here”. That’s really all they want. They want a conversation. They both want a conversation.’

There was no immediate reaction from the Sussexes’s team of PR people – either in London or California – about whether Miss King was speaking at their request.

But as one of their closest friends and media allies in the US, it is unthinkable, say insiders, that they would not have at least been aware that she may choose to brief it.

Royals aides appeared to be genuinely horrified that either the duke or duchess would personally choose to tell anyone, let alone a television journalist, about intimate and highly confidential conversations that Harry was having with his closest family.

They fail to see how it will go any way towards repairing their damaged relationships or rebuilding the family’s shattered trust – on either side.

One said: ‘The only positive we can take out of this is that at least they are talking. It would be better from now on, however, if that could be done in private space.’