Jason Knauf used to be the communications guy at Kensington Palace a decade ago. He worked for both Prince William and Prince Harry, and Knauf was still working palace comms when Harry fell for then-Meghan Markle. Knauf was there for the Sussexes’ courtship, wedding and the first year of their marriage. Then something switched and he became solely part of William’s team. Knauf was the one who organized the purposefully vague “bullying” accusation against Meghan and Knauf was the one doing William and Kate’s bidding in Meghan’s lawsuit against the Daily Mail. At some point, Knauf shifted from “working at KP” to “CEO of the Royal Foundation” to “informal advisor to Prince William” and he held various positions with Earthshot. Knauf recently gave another quasi-authorized interview about the Waleses and Sussexes to 60 Minutes Australia too, which marked another round of BS “bullying” discourse, timed specifically ahead of the debut of With Love, Meghan. Well, now Knauf has been appointed the new CEO of Earthshot.
Prince William’s Earthshot Prize has announced a change in leadership, as CEO Hannah Jones is stepping down. She will be replaced by Jason Knauf, former CEO of The Royal Foundation, who has been appointed CEO by the Board of Trustees.
The pair are now working together to ensure a smooth transition over the coming months and Hannah will continue to give strategic advice on innovation and sustainability to Kensington Palace.
As they said, Knauf used to be CEO of the Royal Foundation and that’s when he and his team put together the Earthshot Prize as some busywork for William. William got bored of Earthshot pretty quickly, so it was removed from the control of the Royal Foundation and remade as a stand-alone thing, and Knauf also had a position within Earthshot. Now he’s CEO of Earthshot and that means… something. I guess. I mean, the point is that Knauf never really went away. Circa 2022-23, “royal sources” made a big deal about how William’s core team was in flux and many of the people responsible for the shenanigans were gone, but William retained his close alliance with Knauf throughout. Knauf does a lot of William’s dirty work on the Sussex front especially. So this is Knauf’s reward, I guess.
Photos courtesy of Avalon Red, Instar, 60 Minutes Australia screengrab.
