Meghan Markle using 'race card' as a 'decoy', half-sister tells Nick Ferrari

22 April 2022, 10:01 | Updated: 22 April 2022, 10:22

Samantha Markle: Meghan criticism is not motivated by racism

Meghan Markle's estranged half-sister tells LBC that the Duchess of Sussex is avoiding questions about her 'lavish spending' by branding coverage against her as racist.

Nick Ferrari was joined by the half-sister of the Duchess of Sussex Samantha Markle in an LBC exclusive interview.

Following a week of controversy coming from Prince Harry's American interview, uncertainty swirls over whether Meghan Markle and the Duke of Sussex will be at the Queen's Platinum Jubilee celebrations this year.

Ms Markle told Nick earlier in the interview that Prince Harry's claim that he is protecting the Queen by not attending festivities is nonsense.

"There is a school of thought that some of the reaction towards your half-sister is because of her skin colour and that there is a racist element. How true do you think that might be?" Nick asked the former actress and model.

"That was definitely PR that came out in defence of some of her actions", Ms Markle insisted, pointing out that "there was a lot of controversy about lavish spending and lies and things going wrong."

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"I don’t buy it", she said of claims of racism.

"I think when they were held to being accountable for their own actions, suddenly the decoy was the race card."

"It wasn't brought up when there was a $40 million wedding and a lovely choir and, you know, the fab four running around with wind blowing in my sister's hair and great pictures."

Ms Markle argued the accusations by her half-sister are unfounded, given how welcomed she was into the Royal Family.

"It was so much opportunity, so much unity and race was never mentioned. In fact, I think it was the first time in history that there was the perception of equality between socio economic class and race."

In the Duke and Duchess of Sussex's interview with Oprah Winfrey, Prince Harry branded the UK media landscape as a "toxic environment" which was "inherently corrupt or racist" and this culture filtered into coverage of Meghan.

In the same interview, Meghan stated that the Royal Family offered "no support" from attacks from the media.

In a statement released early on in their relationship, Prince Harry accused media coverage of Meghan Markle of possessing "racial undertones".