For the first time in the history of the Miss America organization, a transgender teenager in New Hampshire won a local pageant qualifying him to compete in the state pageant and ultimately for the Miss America national crown.
Last week, Brían Nguyen, a 19-year-old biological man, won the Miss Greater Derry 2023 pageant that comes with a crown, the title, and a scholarship, WPDE-TV reported.
According to the outlet, the Miss Greater Derry Scholarship Program, founded in 1986, provides “scholarships to young women between the ages of 17 and 24 living in the Greater Derry area recognizing their outstanding achievements in scholastic aptitude, talent, character, community service, and poise.” The station took the information directly from the Greater Miss Derry website which has since been removed.
Nguyen announced his win in an Instagram post. Social media users responded wondering how Nguyen was allowed to participate in a competition for young women. “How absolutely ridiculous,” one Twitter user wrote.
“And a scholarship was up for grabs. Another thing he’s robbed from a woman,” another user wrote. “If this sounds the death knell for women’s beauty pageants, good.”
And another user wrote, “Seriously!! The only reason that ‘she’ won was because he is trans. If an actual female presented like ‘she’ did they would not win.” CBN News has reached out to the Miss America organization for comment. We’ll post a response here if we hear back.
The news of the biological male’s win in the New Hampshire local beauty pageant comes after the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 9th Circuit ruled earlier this month that a separate beauty pageant association could exclude a transgender “female” (i.e., a male) from participating in its contests.
A rule of the Miss United States of America (Miss USA) pageant allows only “natural born females” to compete in its competitions. In a commentary for The Heritage Foundation’s The Daily Signal, Sarah Parshall Perry wrote “the decision was a major win for the First Amendment right to be free from compelled speech.” (SOURCE)
