King Charles had a long day on Wednesday. He and Camilla are hosting the German president and first lady at Windsor Castle for a three-day state visit. Charles looked tired at the start of the day, and he looked positively ragged by the state banquet. I sometimes wonder if his health issues will get to the point where he’ll have to make more specific disclosures about what’s going on. His long-time biographer Robert Jobson recently wrote about how much pain Charles was in before his cancer diagnosis, and I would not be surprised if we found out that Charles was basically maintaining his public appearances with a cocktail of painkillers and steroids.

The one positive for Charles these days is that no one is throwing eggs at him anymore. But his events are still being protested, especially the events where Republic has some lead time to get organized. Republic planned to protest the carriage procession in Windsor yesterday, but the cops shut it down and threatened to arrest anyone mocking the king.

Anti-monarchist activists have said they were threatened with arrests when they planned to protest a royal procession in Windsor on Wednesday. Charles is hosting German president Frank-Walter Steinmeier and his wife Elke Budenbender in Berkshire as part of the state visit. Campaigners with Republic had planned to hold up a banner saying “Charles, what are you hiding?” as the German visitors passed by.

The protest aimed to put pressure on the King to come clean about what he knew about his brother Andrew Mountbatten-Windsor’s relationship with notorious paedophile Jeffrey Epstein. But campaigners said that they were told by police they faced arrest if they protested near the royal procession, with police citing concerns about the banner and amplified noise.

Officers were also accused of telling protesters they faced arrest if they heckled the monarch.

Graham Smith, CEO of Republic, said: “Thames Valley Police have today decided that protests are essentially banned. Free speech is conditional on arbitrary decisions by police inspectors, denying people even the right to heckle public figures. This is a disgraceful attack on free speech and the right to protest. It’s a complete travesty that citizens of this country are not allowed to voice their opposition to our unelected head of state.”

He said that a formal complaint would be lodged against the police, adding: “We won’t back down. We will continue to protest wherever the royals go. This isn’t just about opposing the monarchy, it’s about defending our country’s most fundamental rights.”

[From The National]

This is the kind of story which keeps me from expressing too much sympathy for Charles. While I get that a Republic protest during a state visit would be severely embarrassing, it’s also just… free speech. People should have the right to mock and protest heads of state and state officials. Period.

Photos courtesy of Avalon Red, Cover Images.