Prince Harry’s visa should be denied and he should be deported from the U.S., a conservative group is demanding.

When Prince Harry detailed his history with pot and other drugs in his autobiography, he made heads roll, especially in conservative circles on both sides of the Atlantic. The Heritage Foundation—a conservative think tank in operation for over 50 years—called for the deportation of Prince Harry over his admissions to past drug use including pot and cocaine. 

The Duke of Sussex, 38, is currently living in Los Angeles with his wife Meghan Markle and son, Archie. But Harry is living on a visa, and has no plans of seeking permanent U.S. residency or U.S. citizenship, despite being eligible. The couple quit the Royal Family and moved to California in January 2020, where they continued to be a focal point for tabloids and aggressive paparazzi.

A representative from The Heritage Foundation said the organization is in arms with the U.S. State Department, as they are refusing to release any details about Prince Harry’s visa application, The Mercury News reports. 

The power couple is often the target of conservative media, which often sides with the Royal Family instead of Prince Harry. The Heritage Foundation entered the arena by challenging his visa status.

“This request is in the public interest in light of the potential revocation of Prince Harry’s visa for illicit substance use and further questions regarding the Prince’s drug use and whether he was properly vetted before entering the United States,” Mike Howell, director of the Heritage Foundation’s Oversight Project, told the Daily Mail.

In Prince Harry’s controversial autobiography Spare, which was published this past January, he revealed that he first snorted coke at age 17 and again on a few other occasions. He also toked up after his first date with Meghan Markle. “I started doing it recreationally and then started to realize how good it was for me,” Harry said. “I would say it is one of the fundamental parts of my life that changed me and helped me deal with the traumas and the pains of the past.”

Prince Harry also detailed his adventures with shrooms, talking to the toilet and having strange visions. High Times has been following reports of his pot use since at least 2017. (Tyler Dooley, Meghan’s nephew and the son of Meghan’s half-brother Thomas Markle Jr., got into the cannabis industry back in 2015 and released the Markle Sparkle strain.)

Is Prince Harry’s Visa Truly at Risk?

But according to law, visa records are considered confidential. “Visa records are confidential under Section 222(f) of the Immigration and Nationality Act (INA); therefore, we cannot discuss the details of individual visa cases,” a U.S. State Department spokesman said. 

Legal experts aren’t sure if Harry’s past drug use actually could threaten his visa status, allowing him to stay in the United States to live and work. “An admission of drug use is usually grounds for inadmissibility,” former federal prosecutor Neama Rahmani told Page Six. “That means Prince Harry’s visa should have been denied or revoked because he admitted to using cocaine, mushrooms and other drugs.”

New Jersey-based attorney James Leonard, disagreed with Rahmani and said that Prince Harry’s visa status is not at risk.

“Absent any criminal charge related to drugs or alcohol or any finding by a judicial authority that Prince Harry is a habitual drug user, which he clearly is not, I don’t see any issue with the disclosures in his memoir regarding recreational experimentation with drugs,” Leonard said.

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Visa recently issued a memo detailing a common scheme being used by businesses in the cannabis industry—“cashless ATM” point-of-sale (POS) transactions. Cashless ATM transactions take place when a merchant takes an order, rounds up the total to an even number, and then runs a transaction, miscoded as an ATM withdrawal.

While cannabis companies weren’t explicitly mentioned in Visa’s memo—there’s a good chance it was directed at such companies given the prevalence of cashless ATMs in the cannabis industry. With few options left in the cash-only industry, businesses will try just about anything to make credit and debit card purchases possible.

“Visa is aware of a scheme where POS devices marketed as ‘Cashless ATMs’ are being deployed at merchant outlets and are operating in violation of the Visa Core Rules and Visa Product and Service Rules and Plus Core Rules and Plus Product and Service Rules,” the memo reads.

Typically, a purchase is rounded up to the nearest denominator of twenty dollar bills. Cashless ATMs mimic standalone ATM machines, running the transaction backwards, so to speak. Visa explained that the practice is in violation because it affects the integrity of an ATM transaction, something Visa never intended to do.

“Cashless ATMs are POS devices driven by payment applications that mimic standalone ATMs. However, no cash disbursements are made to cardholders,” the memo continues. “Instead, the devices are used for purchase transactions, which are miscoded as ATM cash disbursements. Purchase amounts are often rounded up to create the appearance of a cash disbursement…”

Alternatives are provided from technology platforms that are specifically tailored to meet the financial needs of merchants in the cannabis industry.

“The cashless ATM trend is damaging to investors, dispensaries, and consumers, as when it comes down to it, it’s blatant money laundering,” CannaTrac CEO Tom Gavin told High Times. “Instead of creating loopholes and using a cashless ATM, dispensaries should take advantage of other solutions currently on the market that are safe, legal, and transparent. A proper financial solution should be registered with FinCEN and have a money transmitter license, or be the agent of a sponsor or bank with a money transmitter license in their state.”

Gavin continued, “cashless ATMs harm everyone involved by putting investors’ hard-earned money at risk and the potential of dispensary shutdowns that will hinder medical patients’ ability to access their medicine. Until permanent regulations are available at the federal level, solutions (such as CannaCard) that exist today should be used to manage transactions properly for all parties involved.”

Thousands of dispensaries could be hugely impacted by Visa’s compliance reminder. CannaTrac’s digital payment system simplifies the payment process and provides credit card processing for cannabis business—without having to resort to cashless ATMs.

Cashless ATM Transactions in a Cash Industry

Given federal restrictions on cannabis, the industry remains mostly cash-based, leading businesses to try just about everything to get around the restrictions on credit card transactions. Secure and Fair Enforcement (SAFE) Banking Act would solve that issue, but it was recently stripped from the National Defense Authorization Act (NDAA).

Major credit card networks—Visa, Mastercard, American Express—all avoid the cannabis industry, given the risk of repercussions from federal agencies.

Visa’s memo isn’t entirely clear what the punishment for violation of rules will be, however enforcement will be applied in the event that Visa becomes aware of ongoing cashless ATM practices.

“Acquirers will be subject to non-compliance assessments and/or penalties, when they—or their third party agents—are found in material non-compliance with the Visa Rules,” the memo continues. “When found to have willfully violated the Visa Rules, adversely affecting the goodwill associated with Visa and/or the Plus system, brand, products and services, an acquirer may be subject to further compliance enforcement.”

Until cannabis is removed from Schedule 1 of the list of controlled substances, schemes such as cashless ATMs and other financial loopholes will continue to take place as cannabis companies are left with few other options.

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