Did King Charles invite Princess Beatrice and Princess Eugenie to Royal Ascot amid turmoil around the York family?

Reports emerged this week that the King, 77, invited his nieces to the Royal Ascot horse races in June, with Hello! magazine and The Sun both making the claim.

The reports come after the Daily Mail reported in February that Princess Beatrice and Princess Eugenie were allegedly banned from this year’s Royal Ascot amid concerns connected to their parents’ relationship with Jeffrey Epstein.

ROYAL NEWS reached out to Buckingham Palace for comment.

Hello! alleged that Beatrice and Eugenie were invited to Royal Ascot by King Charles and that senior members of the royal family “continued to check on them.”

A friend of the sisters told the outlet, “The question is, would they want to go to a public event of that nature? They will get criticism whether they go or not – and not just that event. They just can’t win.”

Earlier this week, it was confirmed that Princess Beatrice, 37, and Princess Eugenie, 36, won’t join the royal family for Easter on April 5, with the agreement and understanding of their uncle the King. However, it’s understood that the sisters are expected to join future family celebrations.

Royal Ascot is a special week of horse races held at the Ascot Racecourse each June and a social staple on the royal family’s calendar.

Both Beatrice and Eugenie attended two days of the horse races in June 2025 with their husbands Edoardo Mapelli Mozzi and Jack Brooksbank, and they were spotted chatting with King Charles, the older brother of their father, the former Prince Andrew.

Beatrice and Eugenie’s mother, Sarah Ferguson, also attended two days of Royal Ascot, where she spent time with both of her daughters.

The former Duke and Duchess of York were both named in the U.S. Department of Justice’s Jan. 30 dump of files relating to the ongoing investigation of Epstein in a tranche that shed new light on the apparent depth of their ties to the American financier, who died while awaiting trial on federal sex trafficking charges in 2019.

Being named in the Epstein files does not connote wrongdoing, and the former couple has not been charged with any related crimes.

A few weeks after the file dump, Andrew was arrested at home in Sandringham on suspicion of misconduct in public office, with authorities investigating a claim that he shared confidential information with Epstein in his previous post as a U.K. trade envoy. He was released after about 11 hours in custody and now faces an uncertain legal road ahead.

In late March, a source close to Beatrice and Edo, 42, debunked speculation of tension in the couple’s marriage in light of her parents’ Epstein ties, telling ROYAL NEWS the rumors were “complete nonsense.”

However, a friend told Hello! about the toll the situation was taking on Princess Beatrice: “Bea has found the scrutiny very hard, especially the strain of the past few weeks. It has felt as though things have been in freefall, and she’s being hammered and bullied by commentators.”

In a recent Royal News cover story, friends said the sisters have been lying low, absent from their usual social circuit.

“They’re like a locked ship right now,” one said.

“They are tarnished by this. It has affected their lives a great deal,” royal author Ingrid Seward added about how they’re grappling with the scandals of their parents.