U.S. President Donald Trump says he has no plans to deportPrince Harry, saying the self-exiled royal has “enough problems” with his wife, Meghan Markle.
Trump’s swipe at Markle came during an interview with the New York Post, which asked if the president planned to kick the prince out of the country amid ongoing questions about his immigration status.
“I don’t want to do that. I’ll leave him alone. He’s got enough problems with his wife. She’s terrible,” he told the Post.
The Heritage Foundation, the right-wing think tank behind Project 2025, the presidency blueprint that Trump has been heavily mirroring in the early weeks of his second term, has been pushing to know more about the prince’s immigration status and records ever since the royal admitted to using drugs in the past in his memoir, Spare.
The think tank wants Harry’s immigration paperwork released, arguing there’s a possibility the Duke of Sussex lied on his forms about his past drug use or received special treatment from Joe Biden’s administration to enter the U.S.
FILE – Prince Harry, Joe Biden and Jill Biden cheer on the teams as the U.S.A. competes against the Netherlands in the wheelchair basketball finals during the Invictus Games 2017 at Mattamy Athletic Centre on Sept. 30, 2017 in Toronto.
Chris Jackson/Getty Images for the Invictus Games Foundation
They want to know so badly, in fact, that they sued the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) after it rejected the Heritage Foundation’s Freedom of Information Act request to release Harry’s record.
In 2023, the DHS request was declined, but a judge this week said he is still considering the case.
Get daily National news
On Wednesday, U.S. District Judge Carl Nichols focused largely on how to handle a trio of sworn statements from DHS officials on why the agency was fighting the records request.
Those statements have not been seen by the Heritage legal team, and Nichols is considering whether to release part or all of those declarations to the Heritage Foundation. The judge — who has been shown some, but not all, of Harry’s immigration records — said he’s also considering whether to request more records from the government and whether to call in an outside expert as a consultant.
The prince is not a party in the lawsuit.
The Duke and Duchess of Sussex have voiced their disapproval of Trump over the years.
In 2016, before she had even met Harry, Markle called the then-new president a “misogynist” and “divisive” during an interview with Larry Wilmore.
Years later, in 2019, before a presidential visit to the U.K., Trump dismissed her comments, saying: “I didn’t know she was nasty.” A year later, he said, “I’m not a fan of her. I wish a lot of luck to Harry, he’s going to need it.”
When the next election rolled around, as Trump faced off against Biden, Harry appeared in a video, urging people not only to vote but also to “reject hate speech, misinformation, and online negativity” — words that many took to be a thinly veiled swipe at Trump.
Last year, before he was elected, Trump told Express U.S. tabloid that he would not “protect” Harry.
FILE – Britain’s Prince Harry, Duke of Sussex, and Meghan Markle, Duchess of Sussex, react as Lagos state Gov. Babajide Sanwo-Olu (unseen), gives a speech at the State Governor House in Lagos on May 12, 2024 as they visit Nigeria as part of celebrations of the Invictus Games anniversary.
Kola Sulaimon/AFP via Getty Images
“I wouldn’t protect him. He betrayed the Queen. That’s unforgivable. He would be on his own if it was down to me.”
Trump, in his Friday interview with the New York Post, went on to state he thinks “poor Harry” is “whipped” by Markle.
Trump did, however, take a moment to praise Harry’s older brother, Prince William, whom he met privately in December 2024 at the reopening ceremony of Notre-Dame Cathedral in Paris.
“I think William is a great young man,” he said.
