LONDON – The document filed on April 17 at Britain’s corporate registrar, Companies House, was just a few lines long. But its purpose was to formally update the country of residency for one “Prince Henry Charles Albert David Duke of Sussex” – otherwise known as Prince Harry.

For years, Prince Harry and his American wife Meghan have considered California home. The document updated the residency of the British royal to the United States for official paperwork for his business Travalyst, a non-profit sustainable travel initiative.

The paperwork was just a bureaucratic formality. But it underscores just how far Prince Harry, 39, has come from his days as a central member of the royal family in the country of his birth, to a very different life with his wife and children in California.

It also comes at a time of turmoil for the House of Windsor.

Prince Harry and Meghan moved to Montecito, California, after stepping back from royal duties in 2020, amid a rift with the royal family.

Prince Harry said in February that he had considered becoming a US citizen. He told ABC’s Good Morning America: “It’s a thought that has crossed my mind, but it’s not a high priority for me right now.”

But there had been little in the way of official confirmation of Prince Harry’s residency status until this week.

The filing indicates the change of residency dates to June 29, 2023, the day that Buckingham Palace confirmed the couple had vacated Frogmore Cottage, their British home. Queen Elizabeth II had offered the home to the couple when they were married in 2018.

It is unclear what type of US visa or residency permit Prince Harry holds, despite efforts by conservative activists in the US to ascertain it, including a current lawsuit.

He could be eligible for a green card through his marriage to Meghan, a US citizen. Immigration lawyers have pointed out that he could also be entitled to an A-1 diplomatic visa, available to members of a reigning royal family.

The Heritage Foundation, a US conservative research institute, launched a lawsuit against the US Department of Homeland Security in June 2023 to see documents related to Prince Harry’s visa, saying the group had a right to see them as part of research into whether his application for residency should have been rejected because of past drug use.

Prince Harry, the fifth in line of succession to the British throne, wrote in Spare, his 2023 memoir, that he had used cocaine and other drugs in the past.

In March 2024, former US president Donald Trump told right-wing British broadcaster GB News that he would take “appropriate action” if Prince Harry was found to have lied on a visa application.

The Heritage Foundation had sought the documents specifically to investigate how the prince had been admitted, since some visas require applicants to answer questions about past drug use and legal violations.

The US Department of Homeland Security declined to make those documents public when they were requested to do so in 2023, stating that there was no “public interest in disclosure sufficient to override the subject’s privacy interests”.

But in March 2024, a US federal judge ordered the department to submit documents related to Prince Harry’s visa for the court to review, in order to determine whether they should be released under the Freedom of Information Act.

Back in Britain, the royal family has been going through a tumultuous time, with King Charles III and Catherine, Princess of Wales, both revealing cancer diagnoses earlier in 2024, and with few other members of the royal family available to carry out public duties.

On April 18, Prince William – Catherine’s husband and Prince Harry’s elder brother – attended his first royal engagement since his wife announced in March that she was being treated for cancer. NYTIMES