Every family has a black sheep. You know, the uncles with a string of DUIs, that older brother who came back from college praising Jordan Peterson, your awkward grandmother who complains a little too loudly about the ethnicity of her nurses. That said, it’s difficult to think of anything much worse than the Royal Family’s situation with Prince Andrew.
For much of his life, he steadily built a reputation as “Randy Andy,” raising eyebrows for his high-profile overseas trips with little apparent purpose (seeing him pick up another nickname “Airmiles Andy”). But all that was blown out of the water in the 2010s when the extent of his friendship with notorious pedophile Jeffrey Epstein and his accomplice Ghislaine Maxwell were made clear.
Cut to the present and, after the nuclear-level disaster of his 2019 interview with Emily Maitlis, Andrew has been forced to lay low. Despite that, he’s still a magnet for bad press, including the revelation he’s linked to an alleged Chinese spy. And now word is he’s trying to wriggle his way back into public life (to the horror of the government, who dubbed him “that nonce“).
It’s very easy to imagine King Charles wailing “will no one rid me of this turbulent prince?”. Andrew is apparently almost impossible to evict from the Royal Lodge, leaving him as a perpetual headache for a monarchy on a constant desperate hunt for positive press. Now royal expert Richard Fitzwilliams claims he explicitly warned Charles that he needed to do something about Andrew — and didn’t mince his words.
As per AFP, he said that “the disgraced royal has become a source of embarrassment for his brother King Charles III following a devastating 2019 TV interview in which Andrew defended his friendship with billionaire Jeffrey Epstein.” Fitzwilliam left Charles with the stark conclusion that his brother is “just a walking disaster.”
It’s hard to disagree. In previous centuries a prince like Andrew would find himself consigned to a moldy and damp castle somewhere far out of sight and mind, or potentially fall victim to an unfortunate but powerfully deadly accident. Unfortunately for Charles, he’s king in the 21st century so can’t just order him into exile and must grit his teeth and put up with him.
Charles also faces the conundrum that royal punishment of Andrew has already been quite extensive, as he was already stripped of his titles soon after the Maitlis interview. Going further than that, i.e. fully casting him out of the family and stripping him of any access to royal funds, would set a precedent that’d infuriate the rest of his family. In addition, imagine the kind of embarrassing stuff Andrew would get up to if he suddenly needed to make money to support himself? I’d give it a week before he’s on I’m a Celebrity… Get Me Out of Here.
So, at least as far as Charles is concerned, this “walking disaster” of a brother is best left to rot inside his decaying mansion, spending his time golfing, playing with his bears, and staying out of the spotlight. But, if as Fitzwilliam claims, he’s “very clearly, he’s trying to hedge back into the business world,” we suspect more drama is just over the horizon.
