The royal family “chose to completely ignore” the Black Lives Matter movement after George Floyd was killed by former Minneapolis police officer Derek Chauvin, according to a new bombshell book.
In an advanced copy of “Endgame: Inside the Royal Family and the Monarchy’s Fight for Survival” obtained by Pvnew, journalist Omid Scobie claims that the royals purposely stayed away from the matter.
“During my years covering the royals I have regularly been surprised by the Palace’s blasé attitude when it comes to anything to do with race, racism, or the issues that impact those from minority backgrounds,” the 42-year-old writes.
Scobie says in “Endgame” that after Floyd was murdered in May 2020, the “resurgence of the American-born Black Lives Matter (BLM) movement spawned international protests against systemic racially motivated police brutality” and “unrest hit the streets of London.”
“A global civil rights issue was forcing change around the world, but the royal family chose to completely ignore it,” he alleges in the book.
“As often as I emailed or phoned the Buckingham Palace communications team (more than weekly during the height of the BLM marches), my requests for on- or off-the-record guidance on whether we may see family members acknowledge this hugely important moment went noticeably unanswered — they responded to other queries I had, just not that one.”
The Harper’s Bazaar editor-at-large adds, “The Palace famously stays away from anything it considers political, but unlike the political intricacies involved with the movement in the United States, BLM support in Britain simply meant standing up to and against racism.”
Scobie writes that several leaders and activists in the United Kingdom spoke out on the issue, but the British royal family’s silence “was hard to ignore.”
The “Finding Freedom: Harry and Meghan and the Making of a Modern Royal Family” author claims that he met with a Palace senior aide at a hotel bar in August 2021 and was told why the royal family chose to ignore his request for comment on the BLM movement.
“‘We didn’t [reply] because it felt like you were trying to get a headline, quite honestly,'” the unnamed aide allegedly said. “‘You would have turned [the family not saying something] into a story.'”
The aide said that a Harper’s Bazaar op-ed that Scobie wrote that March titled “Stifling, Toxic, and Racist—Duchess Meghan Never Had a Chance” was too “pointed” for the royal family’s liking.
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“‘You called us white supremacists,'” the senior aide added — a claim that Scobie says “wasn’t entirely accurate.”
Pvnew has reached out to a rep for the royal family for comment but did not immediately hear back.
In September 2021, Kenneth Olisa, the first Black Lord-Lieutenant of London, shared whether the royal family supported the principle of the BLM movement.
“The answer is easily yes,” he told Britain’s Channel 4 News at the time.
“The question is what more can we do to bind society to remove these barriers? They [the royals] care passionately about making this one nation bound by the same values,” Olisa added.
Claims of racism and prejudice have long plagued the royal family.
Meghan Markle — a biracial woman who wed King Charles III’s second-born son, Prince Harry, in 2018 — famously claimed that the royal family made racist remarks about what the skin color of her and Harry’s son, Archie, would be.
Scobie claims in his book that the Duchess of Sussex, also 42, wrote private letters to King Charles, in which she named the two people who took part in those “conversations.”
Additionally, in November 2022, Lady Susan Hussey, who served as a Woman of the Bedchamber to Queen Elizabeth II, resigned after she faced backlash for questioning the nationality of Ngozi Fulani, the former CEO of the only domestic abuse charity in the UK that caters specifically to women and girls of African and Caribbean heritage.
“Endgame: Inside the Royal Family and the Monarchy’s Fight for Survival” is set to be released on Tuesday.
