Amid the Black Lives Matter movement around the world, Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.'s son has spoken up about the treatment of America's most famous British royal.
In an interview with Britain's i newspaper, Martin Luther King III addressed what Meghan Markle faced from the British public and press once she became Prince Harry's significant other, notably different from other members of the royal family as she is an American woman of color.
King said he was "greatly disappointed" watching the media coverage unfold. "The reports that I saw were very, very, very difficult reports of how she was treated," he said.
However, King also noted he was not shocked.
"In other words, it's not like 'oh, wow, that that's a surprise' because these institutions have been here forever," he explained to i. "And the institutions have been structured in a certain way. So when you operate as Harry just happening to fall in love with someone who is not in the traditional set of circumstances, then there was going to be pushback."
As he said, "I think that's the process that we have to still continue to work through to rid our society of racism."
In October 2019, Prince Harry spoke out publicly against the British tabloid press' treatment of Markle, stating in part, "Unfortunately, my wife has become one of the latest victims of a British tabloid press that wages campaigns against individuals with no thought to the consequences – a ruthless campaign that has escalated over the past year, throughout her pregnancy and while raising our newborn son."
At the time, a legal spokesperson from Schillings representing the Duchess of Sussex said, "We have initiated legal proceedings against the Mail on Sunday, and its parent company Associated Newspapers, over the intrusive and unlawful publication of a private letter written by the Duchess of Sussex, which is part of a campaign by this media group to publish false and deliberately derogatory stories about her, as well as her husband. Given the refusal of Associated Newspapers to resolve this issue satisfactorily, we have issued proceedings to redress this breach of privacy, infringement of copyright and the aforementioned media agenda."
Around that time, a spokesperson for The Mail on Sunday told E! News in a statement, "The Mail on Sunday stands by the story it published and will be defending this case vigorously. Specifically, we categorically deny that the Duchess' letter was edited in any way that changed its meaning."