Meghan Markle and Prince Harry shocked the world when they stepped down as senior royals earlier this year. Now, an expert is speaking out to reveal why she thinks they made this decision.

Royal author and expert Penny Junor believes that Meghan did not understand just how many restraints are on members of the royal family as to what they can do or say in public. For example, royals are not allowed to talk about politics, and they offer support rather than take center stage themselves when helping out charities. Neither of these rules sat well with Meghan, according to the royal expert.

“I would have thought part of the appeal of marrying Harry might have been having a platform for her activism,” Junor told The Express. “But I think probably what she found when she arrived inside the Royal Family was that she couldn’t be as active as she wanted to be. She couldn’t be as outspoken as she wanted to be.”

“The Royal Family doesn’t operate in that way, they don’t use their position in order to make change,” she added. “They use it to highlight issues and support issues but not to actually drive change. They are not as powerful as she might have thought they were.”

After her engagement to Harry was announced in November of 2017, Meghan was asked what she hoped to do with her role as a royal.

“The causes that have been very important to me, I can focus even more energy on,” she said at the time. “Because very early out of the gate I think you realize once you have access or a voice that people are willing to listen to, with that comes a lot of responsibility, which I take seriously.”

Meghan added that her passion for humanitarian work was something that she and Harry bonded over right away during their first date in London.

“It was one of the things we first connected on,” she said. “It was one of the first things we started talking about when we met – just the different things that we wanted to do in the world and how passionate we were about seeing change. I think that’s what got date two in the books.”

Since leaving the royal family, Meghan has been increasingly outspoken about politics, fueling speculation that she may run for office herself.

“I think it’s perfectly possible,” Junor said of these rumors. “She has no restraints anymore. As a member of the Royal Family, you couldn’t possibly do that but they’re not anymore. But in terms of her running herself, you’d need a shed load of money.”