The notion that titles could be removed once seemed outside the realm of possibility — until the former Prince Andrew was effectively reduced to Andrew Mountbatten-Windsor following widespread public backlash. According to Bower, that moment also served as a wake-up call for Meghan.
“I don’t think Meghan realized until Harry told her that his uncle had lost his title, that that is a reality,” he said. Bower believes that once Meghan understood that titles could be stripped without hesitation, the stakes became far more serious.
“I don’t think she, or any of us, realized they could be so ruthless. I can only imagine she’s now sitting there thinking, ‘What are we going to do?’ Because without the titles, who is she? But she is betraying the royal family every time she uses the title,” he added.
A Brewing Confrontation
When Harry and Meghan stepped back as senior working royals in 2020, they agreed to stop using their HRH styles and to avoid leveraging their titles for commercial purposes. While Buckingham Palace allowed them to keep their Duke and Duchess of Sussex designations, the expectation was that they would not exploit them for branding.