Homeland Security ordered to release Prince Harry's immigration application
March 17 (UPI) -- A federal judge ruled Prince Harry's immigration application must be released by Tuesday to determine whether he disclosed drug use before coming to America.
U.S. District Judge Carl Nichols, who was appointed by President Donald Trump in 2019, gave the deadline to the Department of Homeland Security. The federal agency plans to release a redacted version of the application, NBC and USA Today reported.
The federal government in the past has said the "request does not meet the public interest standard set forth" in Freedom of Information Act guidelines.
In September 2024, the same judge in Washington agreed with the government, ruling against the Heritage Foundation, a conservative think tank that had been seeking the records for several years under the act.
The Heritage Foundation appealed and the judge agreed in February to release the forms with redactions, something the agency also would abide by as long as the disclosure would not violate Harry's privacy.
"Those redactions appearing appropriate, the government is ordered to lodge on the docket the redacted versions of those documents no later than March 18, 2025," Nichols said Saturday.
The Heritage Foundation published Project 25, a policy guide mirroring many of Trump's policies.
The think tank has alleged Duke of Sussex may have concealed past drug use that would have disqualified him from obtaining a U.S. visa.
Writing in his 2023 memoir, "Spare," Harry recalled several times he snorted cocaine, starting when he was 17, and experimented with psychedelics in the 2000s. He also said he smoked marijuana, including "an entire shopping bag of weed." This gave him a "party-boy image."
"It wasn't much fun, and it didn't make me particularly happy, as it seemed to make everyone around me, but it did make me feel different, and that was the main goal," he wrote.
The 42-year-old duke has not been available for comment to media outlets.
Prince Harry stepped away from the royal family in early 2020, and first moved from England to Canada for a short time.
The family, including his wife, Megan Markle, and their children, Archie and Lilibet, now live in Montecito, Calif., near Santa Barbara.
President Donald Trump has said he won't seek to have Prince Harry removed from the United States.
"I don't want to do that," Trump told The New York Post in February. "I'll leave him alone. He's got enough problems with his wife. She's terrible."
Meghan has labeled Trump as a "misogynist."
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