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- Prince William told the press he hasn't spoken to Prince Harry after his Oprah interview.
- The lack of contact could be surprising, but it makes sense given the state of their relationship.
- Plus, William might not be able to contact Harry because he is the future king.
- Visit Insider's homepage for more stories.
Four days after Prince Harry and Meghan Markle's bombshell interview with Oprah Winfrey, Prince William told the press he hasn't spoken to his brother.
The Duke of Cambridge told reporters on Thursday he hadn't talked to Harry but that he "will do," also saying that the royal family is "very much not a racist family."
To members of the public, it's shocking that William wouldn't have talked to Harry following the interview, in which Markle revealed Kate Middleton made her cry, Harry said members of his family made racist comments about Archie's skin before he was born, and Markle shared that she was having suicidal thoughts but wasn't allowed to get help during her time as a senior member of the royal family.
But the royal brothers have been growing apart for some time, with rumors of a rift between them circulating for years.
Plus, William's status as the future King of England makes any contact he has with his brother more complicated, which may be preventing the brothers from communicating.
William and Harry were close as children and throughout their early adulthoods
The brothers have seemingly had a close relationship throughout their lives. They look like any other pair of siblings in photos from their childhood.
They were often photographed playing together as children and attended the same boarding school in their adolescence.
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William has also gone on record to say that their mother's death made their relationship even stronger. In a video from 2017, he said they are "uniquely bonded because of what we've been through."
As they grew up, the brothers seemed to maintain that bond, working together in the military and serving as each other's best man at their royal weddings.
Harry was often photographed at events with Middleton and William after their marriage, and he reportedly visited his niece and nephew often in the early years of Prince George and Princess Charlotte's lives.
"Harry had always loved popping across the grounds of the palace to see Charlotte and George, bringing them gifts that included an electric SUV for his nephew and a tricycle for Charlotte," Omid Scobie and Carolyn Durand wrote in their biography "Finding Freedom: Harry and Meghan and the Making of a Modern Royal Family."
But Harry has reportedly always come second to William, limiting what he could do as a royal
Although they appeared to be close, William was no normal big brother to Harry.
He was first and foremost the heir to the throne, and he has been since the day he was born.
Although it doesn't seem like that would have much to do with Harry, it impacted the way people treated them, according to Scobie and Durand.
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"Where you are born in this family dictates your position of power, and because of that, Harry has always come second to his brother, especially when it comes to the funding," an anonymous palace aide told the writers.
"There were times in the past that Harry wanted to take on bigger projects and do more work, but he couldn't get the money to support it," the aide went on to say.
The book also noted the brothers had different approaches to the media, and given Harry's issues with the British press, it's possible it became a source of tension between them.
Reports of a rift between the princes have been circulating for years
William and Harry were close for much of their lives, but their relationship has been strained in recent years, with reports of a rift between them beginning to circulate in 2018.
Much of the tension reportedly stemmed from Markle's introduction to the family, as an anonymous source told Vanity Fair's Katie Nicholl that "Harry felt William wasn't rolling out the red carpet for Meghan and told him so" at the time.
Scobie and Durand also wrote that William apparently told Harry not to "rush" his relationship with Markle, leading to the "breakdown" of their relationship, as Insider's Mikhaila Friel put it.
The brothers didn't appear at public events together often between 2018 and 2020, with the public scrutinizing everything from how their wives interacted to how long it took William and Middleton to acknowledge Archie's birth.
Harry appeared to confirm the rift in 2019, saying he and William were "certainly on different paths at the moment."
"But I'll always be there for him and as I know he'll always be there for me," Harry added. "The majority of this stuff is created out of nothing, but as brothers, you know, you have good days, you have bad days."
Because there was already tension between them, Markle and Harry's interview - which has the potential to change the monarchy as we know it - could have led William to want to cut off contact with his brother completely.
William's responsibilities as a future king come before those he has to his brother
It's possible William hasn't spoken to Harry because the interview upset him, but it's equally possible he is unable to talk to his brother at the moment.
William will be the King of England in his lifetime, so everything he does can be taken as an official action on behalf of the crown.
In light of Harry's reveal that Prince Charles wasn't taking his phone calls after their step back, William's advisors might be advising him against contacting his brother in order to be in solidarity with the monarchy.
This isn't the first time the brothers haven't been in contact during a time in which Harry was at odds with the rest of the royal family.
The brothers reportedly weren't speaking following Harry and Markle's decision to step back from the royal family, though they did get in touch after the duke and duchess relocated to California.
At the end of the day, William has proven he will be loyal to the monarchy - even if it costs him his brother.
Representatives for the Duke of Sussex declined to comment for this story, and Buckingham Palace did not respond to Insider's request for comment.