The Princess of Wales was without a private secretary for over a year

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Kate Middleton at the Evelina London’s new children’s day surgery unit on December 5, 2023 in London; Lieutenant Colonel Tom White at the Royal Windsor Horse Show on July 2, 2021 in Windsor, England.
Does Kate Middleton’s new right-hand man look familiar?

At the end of February, the Princess of Wales, 42, brought on Lt. Col. Tom White to lead her staff as private secretary, and the news had social media users noting his resemblance to tennis star Roger Federer. While Princess Kate has not been seen in public for months amid her private recovery following abdominal surgery on Jan. 16, photos of White have sparked online chatter around the resemblance.

“Oh my, he looks like Roger Federer,” one commenter wrote on X with a heart-eyed emoji, and multiple users agreed that the similarity was uncanny.

Last summer, Princess Kate hit the court with Federer, 42, for a behind-the-scenes tour of the Ball Boys and Girls at Wimbledon program, and the two sat courtside together on the second day of the tennis championship. The Princess of Wales is patron of the All England Lawn Tennis and Croquet Club, and Federer told The New York Times he enjoyed watching Wimbledon with her.

“It was so fun sitting next to Princess Catherine. I know her quite well,” said the tennis legend, who retired from the sport in 2022. “She is an avid tennis fan, and she plays herself.”

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Kate Middleton and Roger Federer attend Wimbledon on July 04, 2023.
Although White is new to Princess Kate’s team, he is very familiar with working for the royal family, most recently serving as the late Queen Elizabeth’s equerry.

Though the Queen scaled back her public appearances in her later years amid the COVID-19 pandemic, White was spotted alongside her at the modified Trooping the Colour celebration in the summer of 2021 and again at the Royal Windsor Horse Show.

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Queen Elizabeth attends the Royal Windsor Horse Show with Lieutenant Colonel Tom White (2nd L) in July 2021.
The aide was also on hand to greet former British Prime Minister Boris Johnson at Balmoral Castle on Sept. 6, 2022, where he resigned from the position to pass the role to Liz Truss. The meetings were Queen Elizabeth’s final audiences before her death two days later at age 96.

According to The Telegraph, White joined the Buckingham Palace team in 2020 after serving with the Royal Marines. While serving in Afghanistan in 2009, the soldier, then 22, helped stop a school bombing by the Taliban after wires were spotted under a classroom door before detonation.

The Telegraph reported that White went to Princess Kate’s inaugural Shaping Us National Symposium in London in November and was poised to fill a vacancy open for over a year. The Princess of Wales previously leaned on Hannah Cockburn-Logie as private secretary from 2020 to 2022, before she reportedly departed for personal reasons. Cockburn-Logie replaced Catherine Quinn in the royal role, who was Kate’s private secretary from 2017 to 2019. At the time, the Daily Mail reported that the two left things on the “best of terms.”

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Prime Minister Boris Johnson is greeted by Lieutenant Colonel Tom White at Balmoral Castle on September 6, 2022
 

The Telegraph described the idea of Princess Kate appointing White as “something of a return to tradition for the household, reflecting the royal family’s close ties to the military and a link with her late grandmother-in-law.”

Princess Kate isn’t the only royal to tap a new leader for her team. At the end of February, her husband, Prince William, brought in Ian Patrick to run his office. A former diplomat, Patrick worked at the Foreign and Commonwealth Office in international peacekeeping in Bosnia and Herzegovnia. He is also a trustee of the charity Crohns and Colitis U.K.

On the heels of those appointments will be a CEO-type appointment to head up the couple’s joint teams. The hire has yet to be announced.