This push to remain relatable comes as she uses her royal title and political connections to lobby for her causes.
Shelley Moore Capito, a Republican senator from West Virginia, was one of the legislators who recently received a call from Meghan to discuss the parental leave issue.
“I’m in my car. I’m driving. It says ‘caller ID blocked’,” the senator recounted to Politico.
At first Capito thought it was fellow West Virginia senator Joe Manchin because his calls usually come up as “caller ID blocked” on her phone.
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“And she goes, ‘Senator Capito?’ I said, ‘Yes?’ She said, ‘This is Meghan, the Duchess of Sussex.’”
Capito was baffled how the duchess got her number; it turned out that Democratic Senator Kirsten Gillibrand, one of Congress’s leading advocates for paid parental leave, provided it to her.
Republican Senator Susan Collins, of Maine, also received a call from Meghan.
“Much to my surprise, she called me on my private line and she introduced herself as the duchess of Sussex, which is kind of ironic,” Collins said, an apparent reference to Harry and Meghan’s attempts to distance themselves from the royal family.
Meghan is more popular in the US than in Britain, where she is currently embroiled in a contentious embroiled in a court battle over a British newspaper’s publication of portions of a letter she wrote to her estranged father Thomas Markle after her 2018 marriage.
But Collins didn’t appear overly impressed by her intervention.
“I was happy to talk with her, but I’m more interested in what the people of Maine are telling me about it,” she said.
Prince Harry and Meghan, Duchess of Sussex, arrive at the Intrepid Sea, Air & Space Museum for the Salute to Freedom Gala, Wednesday, November 10, 2021.Credit:AP
Explaining her approach at a conference last week organised by The New York Times, Meghan said: “I just get the phone number, and I call and have a conversation. People are pretty surprised, I think.”
In October, Meghan wrote a letter to Democratic House Speaker Nancy Pelosi and Democratic Senate Leader Chuck Schumer urging them to make parental leave a policy when crafting a massive social spending bill.
The parental leave provision is regarded as dead-on-arrival in Washington because Manchin, the Senate’s crucial balance-of-power vote, has said he does not support it.
In the letter, Meghan described herself as “an engaged citizen and a parent” while writing under the official letterhead of “The office of the Duke and Duchess of Sussex”.
“I know how politically charged things can-and have-become,” Meghan wrote to Schumer and Pelosi. “But this isn’t about Right or Left, it’s about right or wrong. This is about putting families above politics.”
In a video message to the Glasgow climate summit earlier this month Prince Harry and Markle said they were committed to making their joint company, Archewell, net zero emissions by 2030.
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Duchess on line one: Meghan raises eyebrows with political lobbying
Source: Philippines Alive
