As King Charles III continued his holiday break on the Balmoral Estate and Prince William celebrated wife Kate Middleton’s 43rd birthday, Prince Edward, Duke of Edinburgh, took on his older brother’s mantle and represented the Windsors at the state funeral for President Jimmy Carter on Thursday. Carter, who died at the age of 100 on December 29, was honored with a service at the Washington National Cathedral. The duke was seated in the second row next to Canada’s Prime Minister Justin Trudeau, right behind the reunion of the five living former presidents that made headlines.
Edward traveled alongside Gordon Brown, UK’s Prime Minister and leader of the Labour Party from 2007 to 2010. Soon after Carter’s death, Brown wrote that he counted the former president and his wife, Rosalynn, as friends in a Guardian op-ed. After the funeral, the duke was spotted speaking with both President Joe Biden and greeting once-and-future President Donald Trump.
King Charles expressed his condolences and remembered his one meeting with Carter in a statement released soon after his death. “It was with great sadness that I learned of the death of former President Carter,” the king wrote. “He was a committed public servant, and devoted his life to promoting peace and human rights. His dedication to humility served as an inspiration to many, and I remember with great fondness his visit to the United Kingdom in 1977.”
The state funeral marked the second major meeting between Trump and the British royals since the November 5 election, following his brief sitdown with Prince William after a service for the reopening of Paris’s Notre Dame cathedral. Afterwards, Trump shared details about his conversation with the New York Post, adding in some effusive praise for William’s brand new beard.
According to royal historian Ed Owens, author of After Elizabeth: Can the Monarchy Save Itself?, Edward’s presence at the funeral was a sign that the royals will be an increasingly useful tool for diplomacy between the US and the UK during a second Trump administration. “[UK Prime Minister] Keir Starmer and Donald Trump don’t see eye to eye on everything, or at least they’re not going to see eye to eye on everything,” Owens told CNN. “The fact that [Trump] is deferential to the British royal family, impressed by them, I think that bodes well for the UK, if the UK can use the royals strategically.”
Edward’s appearance at the funeral was a reflection of the duke’s continued importance to the monarchy as the lineup of working royals gets smaller. In 2024, Edward and his wife, Sophie, Duchess of Edinburgh, were the family’s most consistent working royals in a year when King Charles and Princess Kate were both diagnosed with cancer and Princess Anne, usually the busiest member of the family, was sidelined after sustaining a “minor” head injury from a horse in June. In October, Sophie made an official visit to Ukraine, and in December Edward made one to Kuwait.
Their daughter, Lady Louise Windsor, is a third-year student at the University of St. Andrew, and in December, their son, James, Earl of Wessex, celebrated his 17th birthday. James still lives with his parents at Bagshot Park, their Surrey home a short drive away from Windsor Home Park, where William and Kate live in the shadow of the historic castle. On January 20, Sophie will celebrate her 60th birthday, and a royal source told Vanity Fair that the palace plans to release a photo of the duchess, but any further celebrations will be “low key by request.”
