One Year After His Disastrous TV Interview, Prince Andrew Remains a Royal Outcast

From Town & Country

Only Prince Andrew knows exactly what he was thinking when he walked into his now infamous interview with the BBC’s Newsnight about his controversial friendship with Jeffrey Epstein. One can presume, however, that he was not expecting that just two days after it aired in full that he would be releasing a statement announcing he was stepping back from public duties.

It has been almost exactly 12 months since Andrew’s disastrous choice of words sealed his own fate, and his November 20, 2019 statement remains the last thing posted on his once busy Twitter feed. It would be hard for anyone to forget his spectacular fall from grace, but the statement also serves as a reminder that time has so far not been a healer for the beleaguered Prince’s public image. If anything, the opposite is true, with Andrew's removal as a face of the monarchy even more total than initially anticipated.

At the time he announced he was stepping back, it was suggested that Andrew would still be expected to attend certain events publicly with his family. Examples cited of when we might see him alongside the Queen and the rest of her descendants included Trooping the Colour, Christmas at Sandringham, and Remembrance Sunday.

But the Duke of York was nowhere to be seen as 10 members of the royal family made their annual pilgrimage to the Cenotaph in central London last week to honor the war dead. The Queen’s second son may have served with the Royal Navy for 22 years and continue to hold honorary military appointments. But now, his every public appearance symbolizes nothing but controversy.

By the time he didn’t show for Remembrance it was hardly a surprise as it followed 12 months of bowing out of appearing publicly at all. The Prince kept a low profile at Sandringham at Christmas last year and did not attend the main 11 a.m. service for which the royals walk past crowds on their way to St Mary Magdalene Church. There was no debate about whether he would be at Trooping the Colour in June because the Queen’s official birthday celebrations were completely overhauled and she was the only royal who attended. But the fact that he did not feature in his own daughter, Princess Beatrice’s official wedding photographs sent the clearest message so far that the idea he can appear publicly at family events is still considered too much of a risk for the monarchy’s image.

Andrew has long been an unpopular royal with the British public, with a YouGov poll in 2011—the year after he was photographed walking with Epstein in Central Park—putting his net approval rating at negative 19. A recent poll by the same firm puts his current net favorability score at minus 73%. There is also no avoiding the fact that the Prince’s friendship with Epstein will continue to cause damage to the Windsor brand whenever the subject surfaces. And the spotlight remains on him over the issue as his friend Ghislaine Maxwell remains in custody charged in connection with Epstein’s crimes—allegations she denies.

However, it has now been almost a whole year since the moment Andrew sealed his fate in the court of public opinion—and for a family whose activities strictly follow the rhythm of the calendar even during unprecedented times, this marks something of a milestone. The question marks over which annual events he would appear at publicly after stepping back have now largely been answered. Perhaps in the future things will change, but for now it appears that Prince Andrew remains, officially, out of the picture.

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