WASHINGTON – The Trump administration finally succumbed to the pressure mounted by a court order and released documents related to Prince Harry’s 2020 visa application.
The documents were released after a court ordered the Department of Homeland Security to release Harry’s documents on requests filed by a foundation named The Heritage Foundation.
Though the government released documents, it still redacted large portions to protect the British Royal’s privacy, claiming that the Brit received no special treatment. The US did not release prince’s visa form and so there is not so much damaging content.
As far as the release is concerned, over 80 pages of court filings and transcripts were released on Tuesday but large sections are covered in black serving no purpose to The Heritage Foundation.
Immigration officials said the Heritage Foundation had not established that the public interest outweighed the right to privacy for Prince Harry.
“Plaintiffs allege that the records should be disclosed as public confidence in the government would suffer or to establish whether the Duke was granted preferential treatment. This speculation by Plaintiffs does not point to any evidence of government misconduct,” wrote Jarrod Panter, an official in the U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services, part of the Department of Homeland Security.
A background of the case is that The Heritage foundation alleges that Prince Harry concealed his past use of drugs, which should have made him ineligible from obtaining a US visa, raising suspicions that a special treatment was meted out to him.
The revelations regarding drugs were made by Duke of Sussex in memoir Spare, where he referred to taking cocaine, marijuana and psychedelic mushrooms; Harry detailed that he first tried cocaine at the age of 17.
“It wasn’t much fun, and it didn’t make me particularly happy, as it seemed to make everyone around me, but it did make me feel different, and that was the main goal,” he had written.
Interestingly, application forms for US visas specifically ask about current and past drug use and if one admits to usage of drug, it can lead to non-immigrant and immigrant visa being rejected.
Though immigration officers have a final say to make a decision based on multiple factors, the Heritage Foundation alleges that Prince Harry lied about his use of drugs which can lead to a lifetime ban from the United States.
Prince Harry relocated to the US with his wife Meghan in 2020 after stepping down as a working royal. It is not certain what visa Harry used to enter the country though his wife is a US citizen; Meghan has criticized Trump even labeling him a ‘misogynist’.
