Prince Harry and Meghan Markle’s popularity has gone down again as the pair continue to suffer the fallout from their interview with Oprah Winfrey in March, according to polling by YouGov.
Positive opinion of the Duke of Sussex, 36, who lives in an £11 million mansion in Montecito, California, with his wife, has fallen by nine points, from 43 percent in April to 34 per cent now.
The Duchess of Sussex, 40, has seen a steady decline in her popularity this year, with positive opinion at 30 per cent in March, falling to 29 per cent in April, and dropping a further three points to 26 per cent now.
YouGov blames ‘poor responses to their statements surrounding the COVID-19 pandemic and the withdrawal from Afghanistan’, for the drop.
Support for Prince Harry and Meghan Markle is falling among Brits according to a YouGov poll, which cites their Oprah Winfrey interview and their views on Covid among the reasons
While the Queen remains the most popular member of the royal family among Brits, Prince Andrew (right) is the least favourite
The couple were criticised for wading into Afghanistan crisis with woke ‘word salad’ statement, in which they said they were ‘speechless’ and feeling ‘the many layers of pain’.
The lengthy statement, released via the couple’s slick Archewell Foundation website, calls on followers to support organisations including the World Central Kitchen, but failed to say how much they would be personally donating or details of how they would help.
Prince Harry’s biographer Angela Levin told FEMAIL: ‘I think Harry and Meghan’s grandiose, comfy and caring comments about the situation in Afghanistan, the disaster in Haiti and new Covid variants is another example of them trying to set up some sort of alternate woke royal family.
‘Like most of their “compassionate” gestures there is no indication about what they themselves will do and whether any donations will be going through Archewell Foundation.
Some commentators on Twitter said they were unsurprised that the couple’s popularity is falling – with some even feeling it is deserved
‘Their comment that they want to “alleviate suffering among those we know and those we may never meet – that will prove our humanity,” sounds so similar to their recent comment we must be compassionate “to those we know and those we don’t know” that makes it sound equally phoney.’
YouGov also cited as their Oprah Winfrey interview, in which the couple accused an unnamed member of the royal family of making a racist comment about what skin tone their son Archie may have.
Prince Harry declined to say who made the comment, but stressed it wasn’t the Queen or Prince Philip.
When it comes to negative opinions of the pair, Prince Harry stands at 59 per cent, with 65 per cent of Britons having an overall negative opinion of Meghan.
When YouGov shared the findings on Twitter, commenters seemed unsurprised by the fall in the couple’s popularity.
One social media user wrote: ‘Well they’ve made history for the wrong reasons biggest ever drop in popularity ratings. They’re fading away.’
Another added: ‘They absolutely truly deserve it. Their favourability ratings must be in minus until they apologises to the Royals.’
A third said: ‘Interesting that Harry ratings are now akin to those of Meghan.
‘The original plunge after their exit reflected some in UK giving a pass to Harry on the behaviour toward Queen. Oprah interview and subsequent stuff is now placing Harry as just as accountable as Meghan.’
Others were more supportive of the couple – blaming the royal family for negative stories about the pair, or saying the data was irrelevant, because Britons are not the couple’s target market.
One Twitter user wrote: ‘Pointless exercise, as H&M long ago realised the UK isn’t their market and, instead, they will be successful with their particular brand elsewhere.’
They are not the most unpopular royal though.
That dubious honour goes to Prince Andrew, who has an overall negative rating of 83 per cent and a positive rating of just 6 per cent, due to his connection to Jeffrey Epstein.
The favourite royal – as ever – is the Queen with 80 per cent of the population having a favourable opinion of the monarch.