LONDON — Prince Andrew may have given up his titles, but the questions about his relationship with Jeffrey Epstein haven’t given up on him — or Britain’s embattled royal family.
Seemingly every day, damaging new reports emerge about Andrew, 65, his friendship with the late pedophile financier, and allegations the prince had sex with trafficked Epstein victim Virginia Roberts Giuffre when she was 17, which he denies.
In her posthumous memoir “Nobody’s Girl” released Tuesday, Giuffre, who died by suicide in April at age 41, said Andrew acted as though having sex with her “was his birthright.”
Andrew, who in February 2022 reached a legal settlement with Giuffre after she filed a civil case against him in a New York court, has repeatedly denied having met her.
But the rolling scandal refuses to go away, and has the potential to inflict further damage on a monarchy whose popularity continues to dwindle after the death of the widely beloved Queen Elizabeth II in 2022.
King Charles III has sought to insulate “the Firm” from the cloud over his younger brother. Andrew said in a statement last week that with Charles’ “agreement,” he would “no longer use my title or the honours which have been conferred upon me,” including Duke of York.
But there are still unanswered questions about what the palace knew, and when, with calls from lawmakers and others for the royals to oust Andrew entirely.
“The deep and wide support for the queen meant the family was able to better weather all the controversies that could emerge — and this is a bad one,” said Craig Prescott, who teaches law at Royal Holloway, University of London and specializes on the constitutional and political role of the monarchy.
“These specific allegations are, of course, extraordinarily damaging in the first place, but they also run counter to some of the causes that members of the royal family take up,” he said.
Friday’s agreement for Andrew to relinquish his titles came after emails published in documents for a court case not involving the prince showed he had been in contact with Epstein for longer than he previously admitted.
That “makes him look, in black and white, a liar,” NBC News’ royal contributor Daisy McAndrew told “TODAY” on Sunday. “And so how can you trust anything else he says?”
Then Sunday, London’s Metropolitan Police said it was investigating reports that Andrew had asked one of its officers to dig up dirt on Giuffre. A Buckingham Palace official told NBC News these reports should be “examined in the appropriate way.”
Monday brought two further revelations: First that Andrew had not paid rent on his Royal Lodge residence for 20 years, revealed in a Freedom of Information request by The Times newspaper to the Crown Estate, which handles royal finances. Neither Andrew nor Buckingham Palace have responded to the report.
Then came the publication of Giuffre’s posthumous memoir.
She wrote that she had sex with the prince on three occasions, including an “orgy” involving “eight other young girls” who “appeared to be under the age of 18 and didn’t really speak English.”
She then suffered three weeks of “irregular bleeding,” before waking up in a “pool of blood” and being taken to hospital by Epstein, she wrote.
Epstein, who died by suicide in jail in 2019 shortly after he was arrested on federal sex trafficking charges, later told her she had suffered a miscarriage, and she suspected him of conspiring with the doctor to keep it quiet, Giuffre said.
On seeing a photo of Andrew and Epstein walking in New York’s Central Park in 2010 — after Epstein was convicted of soliciting prostitution of someone under the age of 18 — Giuffre wrote she was “revolted to see two of my abusers together, out for a stroll.” But “mostly I was amazed that a member of the Royal Family would be stupid enough to appear in public with Epstein.”
Andrew has previously denied these allegations, saying that he has “no recollection of ever meeting this lady, none whatsoever.” In his statement announcing the relinquishment of his titles, he said, “I vigorously deny the accusations against me.”
The civil sex abuse lawsuit brought by Giuffre against Andrew was settled out of court for an undisclosed sum.
Though Buckingham Palace routinely says it does not speak for the prince, Andrew has enjoyed a prominent role at some recent royal events, including the queen’s funeral.
Some lawmakers are demanding that Andrew be formally stripped of his titles by an act of Parliament — a rare foray into regal matters by Britain’s supposedly separate government.
The last time this happened was in 1917, when Parliament used the Titles Deprivation Act to strip German members of the British royal family of their titles during World War I.
That’s not without risks, according to Prescott at Royal Holloway.
“If you have legislation removing the dukedom from Prince Andrew, might a cheeky MP want to table an amendment and remove the dukedom of Sussex from Prince Harry?” he said.
The government indicated it does not support this. Education Secretary Bridget Phillipson said Monday that while “our thoughts have to be with the victims of Jeffrey Epstein, these “are matters for the royal family.”
The nuclear option would involve the king himself using something called “Letters Patent” to strip Andrew of his designation as prince.
In doing so, the palace must weigh distancing itself from Andrew with ensuring the blowback from any further censure does not do even more damage to an institution that requires public buy-in.
“It’s true that the monarchy isn’t voted in,” Prescott said. “But if the public mood shifted and people no longer wanted to have the monarchy, then you imagine that politics would follow.”