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23/08/2018
By TAMMY BAIN
The Miss Nebraska Organization has joined a collective of state pageants supporting Miss America Cara Mund after she wrote a letter claiming a year of mistreatment as Miss America.
In her letter to several previous Miss Americas, Mund said pageant leaders “silenced” and “marginalized” her. She described being called the wrong name by leaders, having her wardrobe rejected and being given limited speaking opportunities at events such as an orientation for this year’s Miss America pageant.
The Miss America chairwoman, Gretchen Carlson, responded Tuesday with her own statement, saying that she “never bullied” Mund and that she wished Mund had voiced her concerns via a phone call.
Carlson also said Mund’s letter lost the Miss America pageant a $75,000 increase in scholarships.
Mund’s letter came after a summer of discord within the pageant system. After the June announcement that the swimsuit contest was being eliminated from the Miss America pageant, 22 state pageant representatives signed a petition calling for the organization’s board of trustees to resign. They cited a lack of communication and transparency.
In response, 30 former Miss Americas signed a counterpetition supporting the leadership.
Until now, Nebraska’s pageant organization and some others had stayed neutral. But in Wednesday’s statement, representatives of 11 state pageants, including Nebraska, said their neutrality wasn’t intended to endorse the current leadership.
Each of the states that had previously stayed silent did so for a variety of reasons, the statement said: “the most critical one for us being that further public scandal would be most detrimental to the future of the program” just weeks from the live telecast pageant on Sept. 9.
The other states listed are Arizona, Iowa, New Hampshire, Maine, Massachusetts, New Mexico, Ohio, Oklahoma, South Dakota and Texas.
Despite the public silence, representatives of the state pageants “have spent hours” in dialogue with state titleholders, board members and community members, according to the statement.
For now, “timing is everything,” the statement reads. “Our attention turns to these young women, as they deserve to have their Miss America moment.”
After the Miss America pageant, the state pageant leaders say, they hope to brainstorm while in Atlantic City “to outline a plan for transition, as the status quo is not acceptable.”
The state pageant leaders wrote that they want leadership that “acknowledges and respects the complexities and variances” of titleholders.
“Effective leadership isn’t reactive,” they wrote. “It’s factual, realistic, proactive and deliberate.”
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