Meghan Markle Heartbreak: Andrew Allegedly Called Duchess an 'Opportunist', Said Marriage to Prince Harry 'Wouldn't Last'

Prince Andrew allegedly branded Meghan Markle an 'opportunist' and warned Prince Harry his marriage 'would not last more than a month,' according to new claims in two books published in the UK and US.

This was revealed after investigative writer Tom Bower and royal biographer Andrew Lownie both set out fresh accounts of behind-the-scenes tensions in the House of Windsor, focusing in part on Harry's relationship with Meghan and Andrew's reaction when she entered the royal fold. Their overlapping versions, while not independently verified, paint an unflattering picture of the disgraced royal's private commentary on the Duke and Duchess of Sussex.

Meghan Markle And Prince Harry Under Fire From Within The Family

Meghan Markle and Prince Harry began dating in 2016, with the American Suits actress quickly becoming one of the most scrutinised women in the world.

The pair married in 2018 and moved into Frogmore Cottage in Windsor, before stepping back as senior working royals in 2020 and relocating to California. The property later became a lightning rod in the family's internal battles over status, money and who belonged where.

In the book Betrayal, Bower describes an awkward moment at King Charles' coronation in May 2023, when Harry and Andrew were driven together through 'driving rain' to Westminster Abbey. Bower writes that, at the time, Andrew was still pushing back against Charles' reported wish that he should give up Royal Lodge, the 30–bedroom residence in Windsor Great Park that he shared with his ex-wife Sarah Ferguson, and move into Harry and Meghan's former home at Frogmore.

'The disgraced Prince was, at the time, still refusing the King's order to move to Frogmore Cottage,' Bower notes, setting up a tense dynamic between uncle and nephew. Harry, freshly arrived from the US and estranged from much of his family, was sharing a car with an uncle who was quietly being squeezed out of royal life.

Against that backdrop, Bower says relations between Harry and Andrew were 'not good'. In some versions of events he collected, Andrew is said to have 'scathingly dismissed Meghan as an 'opportunist' in the early days of the relationship. The book does not claim Andrew used the term in front of Meghan, but rather in private conversations about her.

None of these remarks has been confirmed by Buckingham Palace, by Harry and Meghan, or by representatives of Prince Andrew.

Andrew's Alleged Verdict On Meghan And Prince Harry

Lownie's book Entitled: The Rise and Fall of the House of York goes further. Citing his own sources, the author claims Andrew told Prince Harry he believed the marriage to Meghan would collapse almost immediately.

According to Lownie, Andrew allegedly said the union 'would not last more than a month' and accused his nephew of having gone 'bonkers' and failing to carry out 'due diligence' into Meghan's past.

The language, if accurately relayed, is as blunt as anything yet publicly attributed to a senior royal about Meghan Markle and Prince Harry. Lownie writes that Andrew 'openly accused Meghan of being an opportunist' and even suggested she was 'too old' for Harry, adding that his nephew was making 'the biggest mistake ever.'

It is a striking charge from a man whose own judgement has been widely condemned. Andrew withdrew from public royal duties after his association with convicted sex offender Jeffrey Epstein and the civil sexual assault lawsuit brought by Virginia Giuffre in the US, which he settled without admitting liability.

Lownie told People magazine last month that Andrew and Sarah Ferguson believed they could 'operate like this under the radar', in reference to their conduct and alleged attempts to monetise royal access.

'They're clearly up to their necks in exploiting their royal status,' he said. He also described Andrew as having been 'pampered all the way through his life, in this bubble,' arguing that 'status is everything to him and it's his only sense of identity.'

Those comments are Lownie's characterisations rather than established facts, and Andrew has consistently denied any criminal wrongdoing in relation to Epstein. Nonetheless, they colour the way his reported criticisms of Meghan and Prince Harry are now being read.

When a man repeatedly portrayed as obsessed with rank calls someone else an 'opportunist', it invites a degree of scepticism. Royal aides have long insisted, on background, that the family tried to welcome Meghan in the early stages of the relationship.

The picture sketched by Bower and Lownie suggests at least one senior figure reached a very different private verdict. If true, Andrew was questioning both Meghan's motives and Harry's judgement even as the couple were being sold to the public as a modern, global face of the monarchy.

There is, of course, another layer. Frogmore Cottage, which Andrew was said to be resisting as a downgrade from Royal Lodge, was the very home Harry and Meghan once occupied before leaving the UK. The uncle, reluctant to move into the Sussexes' old house, is the same man who, according to these books, thought the Sussex marriage itself would barely outlast the honeymoon. For a family that thrives on symbolism, it is a telling symmetry.