Prince Harry and Meghan Markle have launched a campaign in the fight against election misinformation—in their latest move in the world of politics.
The Duchess of Sussex has long faced speculation that she could be entering the political sphere, with the couple hiring Obama’s PR guru to work on their team and speaking out about the US election back in 2020. During the last cycle four years ago, feminist activist Gloria Steinem previously told Access Hollywood that Meghan had joined her in calling Americans and asking them to vote. In the interview, Steinem said, “She came home to vote. The first thing we did, and why she came to see me, was we sat at the dining room table where I am right now and we cold-called voters.”
And now it seems the couple are once again wading into the political world, as their foundation launches a campaign against election misinformation. A report from Axios detailed how a “bipartisan coalition with support from Hollywood power players and Prince Harry and Meghan Markle’s Archewell Foundation is working to prepare U.S. voters for a possible deepfake onslaught” during the election year.
According to the report, experts are predicting both “malicious state actors and domestic political operatives” will use deepfake tech and other media manipulation to confuse voters during the US election campaign. Google, Meta, and OpenAI are all pledging to combat deceptive AI election content, while two adverts have been produced by Jesse Dylan, Bob Dylan’s son, to raise awareness for the issue. Meanwhile Prince Harry and Meghan Markle’s organization Archewell is also “helping brainstorm new content.”
Since stepping down as senior royals and moving across the pond, Harry and Meghan haven’t shied away from their involvement in politics. Predictions that the duchess might even move into politics have swirled before.
During the 2020 election cycle, they were both particularly active—releasing a video where they urged voters to sign up and reject misinformation. In the clip, Harry urged voters to “reject hate speech, misinformation and online negativity” with Meghan adding that the presidential race was the “most important election of our lifetime” and pleaded for Americans to use their vote.
In the video, Harry said he was not eligible to vote since he’s a British citizen and revealed he had never voted in the UK either where royals traditionally steer clear of politics. In the film, Meghan said, “We’re just six weeks out from Election Day and today is National Voter Registration Day,” adding, “Every four years we are told the same thing, that this is the most important election of our lifetime. But this one is,” she said.
The Duchess of Sussex also joined the surprise special guests at the United State of Women and When We All Vote online event, throwing her support behind a campaign begun by former First Lady, Michelle Obama. Speaking with the former senior advisor to Barack Obama, Valerie Jarrett, as well as Glamour US’s editor-in-chief, Samantha Barry, and actor Yvette Nicole Brown and DJ Diamond Kuts, she said: “I’m really thrilled that you asked me to be a part of this, this is such an exceptional time. As I was thinking about this a little bit I thought, when I think about voting and why this is so exceptionally important for all of us, I would frame it as: we vote to honor those who came before us and protect those who will come after us, because that’s what community is all about. That’s specifically what this election is all about.”
In 2021, Meghan led a campaign lobbying for compulsory paid leave in the US, writing to the Speaker of the US House of Representatives Nancy Pelosi and Majority Leader in the US Senate Chuck Shumer, as well as cold-calling senators to ask for their support.
The couple also hired the PR guru responsible for getting former president Barack Obama re-elected for a second term in 2022. Miranda Barbot was reportedly been brought onto Team Sussex in order to “overhaul their image,” according to a source speaking to The Mirror at the time. “There are shades of the Clintons or even Kennedys,” the insider told the paper. “It wouldn’t be a huge shock now if Meghan went into politics.”
Indeed, Meghan has been involved in activism for much of her life, beginning as a child when she wrote to Procter & Gamble about a sexist advertising campaign. She also joined protests against the Gulf War aged 10. During her acting career, she became an outspoken advocate for feminism, and was named a U.N. Women’s Advocate for Women’s Political Participation and Leadership in 2015.
This article was first published on Tatler.
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