Who is Kelly Bush? Beauty queen refuses to sign Miss America contract over transgender rights

In an interview with TMZ, Bush said she was forced to give up her title of Miss North Florida because she refused to sign the organization’s revised contract.

She was crowned Miss North Florida in September 2024.

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Weeks later, Bush said she received a revised contract that expanded the definition of “female” to include individuals who were born female or who have fully completed certain gender reassignment procedures.

Bush and her family argued that they entered the pageant thinking it was specifically for biological women.

“I was asked to sign a different contract than the first one I agreed to because they changed it four weeks after I correctly won,” she detailed of the contract discussions.

Bush and her mother immediately signed the contract and got on the phone with the Miss America Organization. “I begged them over and over again through Liberty Counsel, sent videos, sent letters, emails, because they took on my case,” Bush said.

She said the organization had just rejected her request and later “double down” on their decision.

Bush ultimately refused to sign the contract, telling TMZ, “I was unwilling to agree that little boys could become girls, and I took a stand against the Miss America Organization and lost my crown as a result.”

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The Miss America Organization’s latest rules for contestants, emphasized in Bush’s contract, are that they must be “female,” between 18 and 28 years old, single, childless and a U.S. citizen. The regulations define “female” as “an individual who is born female or who has undergone full sex reassignment surgery.”