Two YouTubers claimed to be part of the Kate Middleton edited photo on Mother’s Day to seek an interview with Tucker Carlson over an alleged firing from Kensington Palace.
And it worked.
Josh Pieters and Archie Manners post videos under the YouTube account Josh & Archie. The two set out to see how far they could go in getting an interview by alleging one of them was a Kensington Palace employee who got fired for editing the picture.
They got pretty far. Manners was interviewed by Carlson. The interview was to be aired on the Tucker Carlson Network. None of what Manners said in the interview was true.
After the interview was done, the pair outed themselves by posting a video on X, formerly Twitter, and YouTube.
Pieters told Time they made sure the truth behind the video came out before any damage was done.
“We obviously discussed it, but we thought that it would be a bit irresponsible potentially to let the actual interview publish,” he said, adding that “we just thought that this interview would obviously go so big on Tucker’s channel that it could potentially do some harm. So we thought it was a better idea to get it up first and to show what we did.”
The reason behind the ruse show how people are quick to judge what they see and to see if news organizations screen their interviewees properly.
“We all see things very quickly and are quick to react to things and we have instant access to all kinds of information, and I’m not sure we question enough how verified and validated that information is,” he said.
Pieters is hopeful Kensington Palace will see the prank for what it was and there was no malicious intent.
“I think it is a silly enough thing that we think the palace would probably see the funny side of it,” Pieters said. “But as I said, that’s the reason we didn’t want the interview to go out, to not have this ripple effect of harm going out or more pressure on the Princess.”
The two contacted Carlson’s office by email claiming to be “George,” who was recently fired as Kensington Palace digital content creator
“They are not telling the truth about the Princess’ health, and are now willing to fire staff in order to conceal the truth,” according to the email.
Carlson’s team responded and asked for proof of employment and the original photo.
Pieters then photoshopped the photo so it looked like it was Christmas — even though there were still leaves on the trees.
In a “letter of engagement,” the words “Every Little Helps” in Latin were added to the Kensington Palace logo. “Every Little Helps” is the slogan of British supermarket chain Tesco, Time reported.
“One section of the contract said that if the employee failed their probationary period ‘the company retains the right to amputate 1 (1) limb of their choosing,’” per Time.
Time has reached out to the Tucker Carlson Network for comment.
This prank is the latest in the debacle of the edited photo in light of Kate not being in the public eye after she had surgery in January. Kate admitted to editing the photo.
Kensington Palace said she is expected to return to the public on Easter, March 31.
Manners went on camera to pose as the employee, “George.”
He claimed the photo was “too big to do” and was taken by Kate’s uncle at Christmas.
The two’s video shows Carlson saying, “That was great and it was really interesting, too.”
Manners was then told in a text that the interview would likely broadcast “early next week,” according to a screenshot shown in the footage.
However, the prank was exposed first.
Pieters said he hasn’t heard from Carlson’s team or Kensington Palace about the video, Time reported.
