Reality Verify: Did Jason Knauf Contribute to Meghan Markle’s Miscarriage

Meghan Markle was accused of bullying by an aide who some followers have now instructed contributed to her miscarriage.

Prince Harry stated within the Netflix present Harry & Meghan, which got here out in December 2022, he believed Meghan’s miscarriage was brought on by stress from a lawsuit Meghan filed in opposition to U.Okay. tabloid The Mail on Sunday.

Jason Knauf, who served as Kensington Palace communications secretary from 2015 till 2019, submitted proof within the lawsuit, prompting some on social media to hyperlink his involvement to the lack of Meghan’s being pregnant.

The Declare

Twitter account @ArchewellBaby sought to hyperlink Knauf to Meghan’s miscarriage after King Charles III named him within the honors listing and Prince William personally performed the ceremony that made him a Lieutenant of the Royal Victorian Order.

A tweet seen 1.2 million occasions and appreciated greater than 8,000 occasions learn: “After Prince William accepted tens of millions secretly from Rupert Murdoch whereas Harry takes him to courtroom, in the present day he honored Jason Knauf, who contributed to Meghan’s miscarriage by collaborating with the Day by day Mail.

“Prince Harry dug a grave along with his naked fingers for his unborn baby.”

For context, the tweet’s 1.2 million views are rather less than double the circulation of The Mail on Sunday, which as just lately as March 2023 stood at a mean of 659,454 copies per weekly version, in accordance U.Okay. media information company ABC.

The Info

Prince Harry did hyperlink Meghan’s miscarriage to The Mail on Sunday lawsuit and Knauf did supply proof to the U.Okay. Court docket of Enchantment as a part of that case however the timelines don’t match up.

Harry and Meghan’s Netflix sequence was additionally clear about the reason for the anxiousness and it didn’t relate to Knauf’s participation within the lawsuit.

Meghan first recognized the date of her miscarriage in her November 2020 New York Occasions essay “The Losses We Share.”

“It was a July [2020] morning that started as ordinarily as every other day,” she wrote. “I knew, as I clutched my firstborn baby, that I used to be dropping my second.”

On the time, in the summertime of 2020, throughout a lawsuit on the Excessive Court docket in London, The Mail on Sunday had utilized to make public the names of 5 of Meghan’s buddies who had defended her from British tabloid assaults in nameless interviews to the journal Folks.

Meghan was suing the the paper over the publication of a personal letter she despatched her father and the outlet’s attorneys have been arguing that the story served the general public curiosity as a result of it corrected, they stated, an inaccurate account offered by the buddies.

Within the Netflix present, Meghan stated she needed to maintain her buddies’ names secret: “I stated ‘completely not’ and I simply felt it was vital to guard them in the best way they’re making an attempt to guard me and that was proper in the identical week we moved into our dwelling in Santa Barbara.”

“The primary morning that we awoke in our new house is once I miscarried,” she added.

Prince Harry informed Netflix: “I imagine my spouse suffered a miscarriage due to what The Mail did. I watched the entire thing.

“Now, will we completely know that the miscarriage was created, brought on by that? ‘Course we do not.”

Medical specialists, together with the web site of Britain’s Nationwide Well being Service, recommend anxiousness doesn’t straight result in an elevated threat of miscarriage, however it isn’t attainable to say definitively whether or not Harry is true or incorrect.

Nonetheless, he made no point out of Knauf and nor did Meghan.

Knauf did give a press release within the lawsuit however not till 2021, a yr later. The primary trace he might need related info, based on a number of statements, didn’t come till September 2020, two months after Meghan miscarried. For context, Knauf is identical palace staffer who wrote an e-mail in October 2018 accusing the duchess of bullying two private assistants out of Kensington Palace.

A witness assertion from Mail on Sunday editor Ted Verity, signed on December 4, 2020, and seen by Newsweek outlined the timeline: “I’ve just lately had a gathering with a senior member of the royal family (‘the supply’). The assembly passed off in particular person lower than three months in the past.”

He added: “The data the supply gave me included the next: There have been a number of drafts of the Letter (as outlined above).

“Jason Knauf, a member of the Kensington Palace communications crew, labored on
these drafts with [Meghan]. Numerous the tweaking of the drafts was finished by digital technique of communication.”

Mail on Sunday lawyer Keith Mathieson submitted an October 2021 witness assertion, additionally seen by Newsweek, clarifying: “The [Mail on Sunday] sought to make contact with Mr Knauf in September 2020 after being informed by a supply that he (Mr Knauf) had related proof to present on vital facets of the case.”

He added that the newspaper was “knowledgeable by the supply that Mr Knauf had proof to present that was useful to the [Mail on Sunday’s] case.”

Knauf’s witness assertion was not lastly submitted till September 16, 2021, despite the fact that his legal professional, from legislation agency Addleshaw Goddard, had knowledgeable the courtroom in December 2020 that he is likely to be prepared to testify.

His 2021 witness assertion, seen by Newsweek, learn: “As defined in a letter despatched on my behalf by Addleshaw Goddard on 21 December 2020, I used to be ready to supply proof on a number of points the place my former job had made me aware of related occasions.”

He added: “I’ve adopted a place of neutrality all through, providing to supply info that I’m suggested is related to each events.”

That, although, was 5 months after Meghan’s miscarriage, which occurred in July 2020.

Knauf handed over personal emails and textual content messages despatched between him and Meghan which confirmed she had licensed him to provide info to the authors of biography Discovering Freedom, a reality her attorneys had denied in courtroom, as a part of the aforementioned lawsuit.

The saga prompted Meghan to apologize in her personal witness assertion in November 2021: “I didn’t benefit from seeing these emails and I apologize to the Court docket for the truth that I had not remembered these exchanges on the time. I had completely no want or intention to mislead [The Mail on Sunday] or the Court docket.”

The movie crew making the Netflix docuseries Harry & Meghan captured Meghan’s distressed response to studying of Knauf’s proof whereas within the firm of the previous head of her Archewell Basis, Mandana Dayani. Dayani joined Archewell in June 2021, practically a yr after the miscarriage.

The Ruling

False.

Jason Knauf did give proof to Meghan’s lawsuit in opposition to The Mail on Sunday and his contribution was little question unwelcome, as footage captured by her Netflix documentary suggests.

Nonetheless, his proof didn’t emerge till 2021 and the primary indication he may present it was solely recognized privately to The Mail on Sunday‘s editor, in September 2020, two months after her miscarriage in July 2020. Knauf’s willingness to testify was flagged an additional two months after that, in December 2020.

In the meantime, Meghan and Harry’s personal account of the anxiousness she skilled on the time of her miscarriage pertains to the newspaper’s makes an attempt to call her 5 buddies, a matter that didn’t seemingly contain Knauf or the palace.

FACT CHECK BY NEWSWEEK