The U.K. arrests Price Andrew. Why shouldn’t the U.S. arrest King Trump, who appears to have done even worse?
If no one is above the law, then no one is above the law
By Robert Reich
Police in the U.K. have arrested Andrew Mountbatten-Windsor, the former Prince Andrew and Duke of York, on suspicion of misconduct in public office — after the disclosure of emails between Mountbatten-Windsor and the late disgraced banker Jeffrey Epstein. As I write this, Mountbatten-Windsor remains in custody.
We don’t know yet the specific charges. But we do know that the late Virginia Giuffre, an Epstein victim, accused Mountbatten-Windsor of raping her.
We also know that Mountbatten-Windsor was the U.K.’s trade envoy between 2001 and 2011, and appears to have forwarded to Epstein confidential government reports from visits to Vietnam, Singapore and China, including investment opportunities in gold and uranium in Afghanistan.
Prime Minister Keir Starmer says “no one is above the law.” The family of Virginia Giuffre says “no one is above the law, not even royalty.” Britain’s chief prosecutor says “no one is above the law.”
All of which raises awkward questions about the people implicated on this side of the pond, including the person in the Oval Office who loves to be treated like a king, and who appears in the Epstein files 1,433 times (that is, the files that have been released so far). Prince Andrew appears in them 1,821 times.
America likes to believe we gave up kings almost 250 years ago and adopted a system in which “no one is above the law.”
But Trump’s foreign policy has become a personal tool for him to channel money and status to himself and his closest associates. Since the 2024 election, the Trump family’s personal wealth has increased by at least $4 billion.
As with the British royalty of the 16th century, it’s all personal with Trump — all about expanding his power and enlarging his and his family’s wealth. Proceeds from the sale of Venezuelan oil? “That money will be controlled by me,” he says. The gift of a plane from Qatar? “Mine.” Investments by Middle-East kingdoms in his family’s crypto racket? “Perfectly fine.”
Like the British royalty of yore, King Trump has arbitrary power. He raises Switzerland’s tariff from 30 to 39 percent because its former president Karin Keller-Sutter “just rubbed me the wrong way.” He imposes a 50 percent tariff on Brazil because Brazil refused to halt its prosecution of Trump’s political ally, the former Brazilian president Jair Bolsonaro, who was found guilty of plotting a coup. Vietnam fast-tracks approval of a $1.5 billion Trump family golf course at the same time it seeks to reduce its tariff rate.
Trump claims that Greenland is “psychologically needed,” although the United States already has a military presence there and an open invitation to expand its bases. He muses about making Canada the “51st state.” These are throwbacks to the 16th-century age of empire.
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Meanwhile, Trump has created a system of tribute and allegiance that would make Henry VIII jealous.
Apple’s Tim Cook delivers a gold-based plaque and a donation to Trump’s planned ballroom. Swiss billionaires bring a gold bar and a Rolex desk clock to the Oval Office. Jeff Bezos backs a vapid movie of Melania and hands her a check for $28 million.
Trump pardons Changpeng Zhao, the billionaire mogul who pled guilty to money-laundering violations in 2023, after which time Zhao’s Binance digital-coin trading platform becomes the engine of the Trump family’s crypto business, World Liberty Financial.
Elon Musk’s humongous quarter-billion-dollar contribution to Trump’s 2024 campaign earns Musk a dukedom — a “department of government efficiency”— and the keys to the kingdom in the form of sensitive U.S. Treasury Department software systems used to manage federal payments.
But when the Duke of DOGE starts becoming more visible than King Trump, the king banishes him and revokes his dukedom. When the banished Musk begins openly criticizing Trump, the king threatens to cut off Musk’s head in the form of cutting him and his SpaceX off from valuable government contracts. This puts an end to Musk’s impertinence.
The new TikTok (on which Trump has more than 16 million followers) will continue operating in the United States — but now with the financial backing of Trump ally Larry Ellison’s Oracle, Trump’s allied Emirati investment firm MGX (which has already invested in the Trump family’s cryptocurrency company), and Silver Lake, teamed up with the private equity firm founded by Trump’s son-in-law Jared Kushner.
Trump allows Nvidia to sell chips to the United Arab Emirates and Saudi Arabia and extends military guarantees to Qatar — all of which have invested in the Trump family empire. (Emirati-backed investors plowed $2 billion into World Liberty Financial.)
Instead of national glory, Trump demands personal glory — to get the Nobel Peace Prize, to put his name on the Kennedy Center and Penn Station, and other major monuments and buildings.
If his commands are not met, he punishes. Because Norway didn’t give him a Nobel (it wasn’t Norway’s to give anyway), he “no longer feels obliged to think only of peace.” Because performers refuse to appear at the “Trump-Kennedy” Center, he shutters it.
Instead of bureaucracies, America now has a royal entourage. Instead of institutions, we now have royal prerogative. Instead of legitimacy based on the will of the people, there’s divine right (“I had God on my side,” “God was protecting me,” “God is on our side”).
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We will march against King Trump on the next “No Kings Day” on March 28 — hopefully making it the biggest protest in American history.
But the arrest of the former Prince Andrew raises an issue that goes way beyond protesting and marching. King Trump was evidently involved in Jeffrey Epstein’s nefarious doings. We don’t know exactly how because there’s been no criminal investigation. But shouldn’t there be?
Trump has also been enriching himself and his family through his public office, violating multiple laws about conflicts of interest.
If the U.K. can arrest the former Prince Andrew on evidence of such wrongdoing, why shouldn’t America arrest King Trump? If no one is above the law in the U.K., not even royalty, presumably no one is above the law in the U.S., not even a president.
Pam Bondi obviously won’t investigate Trump because she’s part of King Trump’s court. But what about a group of state attorneys general?
Almost 250 years after we broke with George III, the question must now be faced: Are we a monarchy or a nation of laws?
Melania movie
The 2026 documentary Melania, directed by Brett Ratner, has been widely characterized as a “disaster” due to poor box office performance, intense critical panning as “propaganda fluff,” and significant audience polarization. The film, which cost a reported million to produce with an additional million for marketing, saw a 67% drop in its second week and faced empty cinemas – Forbes
15 Insane Confessions Of A Buckingham Palace Guard
A trusted royal guard spills the secrets of a decade of misbehaviour inside Buckingham Palace. The Queen’s call sign was “Purple One”, and her husband was referred to as “Phil the Greek”.
Prince Andrew, meanwhile, was known simply as “The Cunt”.
By Michael Gillard
1. The guards would turn up to work drunk and disorderly – with disastrous consequences.
Drinking was a “huge part of the culture” among the Queen’s guards, but such was the need to have a full relief of armed officers on duty at all times that Page said even those who turned up smelling strongly of booze were allowed to book out weapons and get on with the job. If they were seriously drunk they might be advised to sleep it off in one of the palace rooms, or given medical relief in the form of “a pack of mints and a Lucozade”. Page recalled one incident when a senior official in the royal household was coming through the palace gates, and instead of lifting the barrier, a hungover officer accidentally pressed the underground ramp button, sending the woman’s car into the air.
2. They got their friends on to the Queen’s protection squad by helping them cheat the entry test.
Life on the royalty protection command was seen as an easy gig and a nice little earner. Page said that he and some colleagues wangled their police friends off the beat and into the palace by tipping them off about the questions they would be asked at interview. Even without cheating, new recruits would have been hard-pushed to fail the flimsy entry test. Page says they were merely required to identify a mugshot of a prominent royal and answer questions such as, “Is it ever OK to read a book while guarding the gate to the Queen’s private quarters?” (Answer: no.)
3. They gave each other lewd nicknames ranging from “Roy the Rapist” to “Doug the Slug”.
4. They snapped themselves striking gun-toting gangster poses on the throne while the Queen was asleep.
Page revealed that he and his colleagues used to sneak into the Queen’s throne room late at night brandishing their guns and would pose for gangster-style photographs on the seat of royalty. “We all sat on the throne and had a laugh,” he said. “Fucking hell! If you get a chance to sit on the throne of England you aren’t going to pass it up.” The Queen’s throne sits on a raised pink stage below a gold domed ceiling and a proscenium arch buttressed by winged figures. Cross-examined at Page’s fraud trial in 2009 about why he would risk the sack by daring to besmirch the royal perch, a fellow guard replied: “Perhaps to say you’ve done that, maybe to your grandchildren.”