Prince Harry may have put his United States visa at risk and could conceivably be barred from his adopted home country if it is found that he lied about his past use of mind-altering substances including cocaine, pot and magic mushrooms, all of which he confesses to have taken in his hotly anticipated new book.
With buzz building to a crescendo over the release of “Spare” which officially hits bookshelves on Tuesday, media outlets are churning out choice tidbits from the personal account of the emasculated British Royal whose marriage to social-climbing diva and D-list actress Meghan Markle has made him into an international tabloid superstar despite the increasingly tense relationship with his own family as a result of his spouse’s constant sniping.
The latest golden nugget mined by the media is the Duke of Sussex’s copping to the use of the drugs, revealing that “he first took took cocaine on a shooting weekend when he was 17 and did “a few more lines” on other occasions. He also confesses to hallucinating on magic mushrooms at a celebrity party in California, and smoking cannabis after his first date with Meghan Markle in London in 2016,” according to a report by the UK Sunday Times.
The outlet states that Harry’s confessions could create problems for him with US immigration authorities, “While US officials said entry is granted on a ‘case-by-case’ basis, the rules state that an individual’s ‘current and/or past actions, such as drug or criminal activities . . . may make the applicant ineligible for a visa.”’
A big question is whether the Duke divulged his dabbling with illicit drugs on his visa application as those seeking temporary or permanent residency must answer a series of questions related to their criminal background and drug usage when applying and according to some experts, Harry could see the privilege revoked if he lied.
Prince Harry 'should have been denied US residency' over drug use revealed in memoir https://t.co/YZqJK54sBE
— Nile Gardiner (@NileGardiner) January 7, 2023
“He would have been asked [about drug use]. If he was truthful in his answers, he should have been denied,” Professor Alberto Benítez, the director of George Washington University’s Immigration Clinic, told The Telegraph.
Benítez said that it would be in the prince’s “best interest” to acknowledge the drug use, “otherwise, he’s perjuring himself on an official US government document”.
The law professor also suggested that Prince Harry may have have received special treatment from immigration officials due to his status as a member of the Royal Family.
“If he wasn’t Prince Harry, if was ‘Fred Jones’ and he had this kind of a background, he’d have a lot more scrutiny and I could certainly see the green card being denied,” Benitez added.
The Duke got out in front of the explosive revelations in a recent television interview.
(Video: YouTube/The Telegraph)
It isn’t clear what type of visa that the 38-year-old Royal, who relocated across the pond to California in 2020, holds but according to the Daily Mail, “analysts speculate he either holds a spousal visa – sponsored by his American wife – or a O-1 visa which is given to people with ‘extraordinary ability'” and “If Harry holds an O-1 visa, which is often given to celebrities and athletes, it would have to be renewed after three years.”
The admission of the drug use could conceivably impact his renewal application, the outlet reported.
Another immigration attorney downplayed the ginger-haired eunuch’s potential for visa troubles over his past drug use.
“In theory, if Prince Harry ever possessed any illicit substances, even if he was not arrested, he would have been required to disclose that,” attorney Chrissie Fernandez told the Telegraph, suggesting that US officials will only ban visa applicants for drug use in “very limited circumstances”.
“As it relates to past drug use without a conviction, it’s unlikely to cause a real problem for him,” she said. “It’s unlikely that his case would be reopened if immigration authorities were to hear that he previously, years ago, used drugs… So unless he talked about using drugs quite recently, it’s unlikely to have affected his getting immigrant status in the US.”
“It was one of the most searing images of the twentieth century: two young boys, two princes, walking behind their mother’s coffin as the world watched in sorrow—and horror. As Diana, Princess of Wales, was laid to rest, billions wondered what the princes must be thinking and feeling—and how their lives would play out from that point on. For Harry, this is that story at last,” reads the Amazon promo for the book. “With its raw, unflinching honesty, Spare is a landmark publication full of insight, revelation, self-examination, and hard-won wisdom about the eternal power of love over grief.”
Only two days remain for those clamoring for Prince Harry’s book to get their mitts on it although much of the really juicy stuff has already been put out by the media.
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