When Senator Leia Organa is asked about her dad, she’ll talk about Jimmy Smits every single time. In the years after Return of the Jedi, within Star Wars canon, Leia did not make her true family lineage public knowledge — and with good reason. How would you feel if one of your elected officials was lying about being Darth Vader’s daughter? And, although Leia has not appeared in Ahsoka thus far, one brief Easter egg in Episode 5 touches upon a strange truth about “Senator Organa.” And the truth is: At this point in the timeline, Leia is living a double life. Spoilers ahead.
In Ahsoka Episode 5, “Shadow Warrior,” much of the plot is focused on the New Republic forces, led by Hera, trying to figure out exactly how long they can hang out on the planet Seatos until they get busted. Hera and Carson are on an unauthorized mission, and therefore on borrowed time. (Though you really gotta wonder why the New Republic needs to send three massive starships to retrieve a few X-wings and the Ghost, but whatever.) Relative to the story of the hidden Skywalkers, we get a quick line of dialogue from Carson that is the first hint at what Leia is up to at this point in the timeline. As he and Hera bicker about how long they can keep going with their search mission, Carson says: “Senator Organa says she can only give us cover for so long.”
“Senator Organa” refers to Leia Organa, who, because she was adopted by Bail and Breha Organa as a baby, openly identifies with that last name in public. Notably, at this point in the timeline, Ben Solo is roughly the age of a toddler. Meanwhile, Han and Leia have been married for a few years at this point, since in the current canon they got married right after the events of Return of the Jedi. So Leia is serving as a senator in the New Republic, and is apparently, pretty sympathetic to Hera.
Star Wars: Bloodline
While it makes sense that Leia and Hera would dig each other — game recognizes game after all — the mention of “Senator Organa” hides a deeper truth about this moment in the Star Wars timeline. Literally, nobody wants to be openly associated with Darth Vader. In the 2016 novel Bloodline by Claudia Gray, it’s made clear that as late as 28 ABY (so 19 years after the events of Ahsoka) it wasn’t public knowledge that Leia was Anakin’s daughter, and that most of the public was unaware that Anakin and Vader were the same person. Ahsoka Episode 5 confirms this notion, when Ahsoka is tight-lipped about the specifics of Anakin, and only refers to her former master as “intense.” Furthermore, when Jacen asks Ahsoka who she’d been fighting with underneath the waves, she just changes the subject.
In the novel Bloodline — which takes place just six years before The Force Awakens — we learn that not everyone knows about the tragedy of Anakin Skywalker, hater of sand. We, the audience, know that Anakin destroyed the Sith and brought balance to the Force, but, wisely, Luke and Leia have been a bit vague about all of that. As depicted in The Book of Boba Fett, around this time, Luke is building his Jedi school, and Leia has likely already decided to opt out of becoming a Jedi, as we saw in the flashbacks in The Rise of Skywalker.
So while it stands to reason that Leia is a major player in the New Republic’s government (she’s running “cover” for her friends) she’s also probably keeping a lower profile than Mon Mothma. Ditto Luke, who, at this time, clearly is not formally associated with the New Republic military or government at all. This is a contrast with Luke and Leia’s story in Legends canon, in which the Darth Vader stuff was much more out in the open. And, in Legends canon, Luke still worked actively for the Alliance/New Republic as late as 5 ABY. In contemporary canon, it’s certainly possible that Luke was flying missions and working for the New Republic right after Return of the Jedi, but his situation in 9 ABY in the current canon is very much outside of the mainstream government.
In Bloodline — which is again about 20 years in the future — Leia is still a prominent senator in the New Republic. But, in that book, the truth about her biological dad, Anakin Skywalker, comes to light. Relative to The Force Awakens, this is why Leia goes underground and forms the Resistance. But, in the present tense of Ahsoka, the point where Leia is outed won’t happen for a long time. Right now, just as she was in the classic trilogy, Leia — daughter of Vader — remains safely anonymous.
