Former Miss Michigan Kathy Zhu was stripped of title over ‘offensive’ tweets. Now she’s joined Trump 2020 campaign
- Zhu was born in China but moved to the US when she was five years old
- She lost her title due to tweets about hijabs and gun violence in the black community
Kathy Zhu, 20, will be part of the Women for Trump Coalition Advisory Board. The official Team Trump account tweeted the news on Thursday, calling her a “patriot who has continued to stand for American values despite being stripped of her crown”.
Zhu was born in China but moved to the US when she was five years old, according to another of her Twitter posts.
At a Women for Trump event in Bloomfield Hills, Michigan on Friday, Zhu said being openly conservative is “harder than coming out as, honestly, gay”.
Last week she received an email from the Michigan state director of Miss World America informing her that the title was revoked because her “social media accounts contain offensive, insensitive and inappropriate content that violate the organisation’s rules and conditions.”
The social media posts pageant officials called into question were related to Muslim women wearing hijabs and to gun violence in the black community.
The Orlando Sentinel obtained screenshots of Zhu’s tweet about the Muslim Student Association at the University of Central Florida offering students the opportunity to try on hijabs.
“There’s a ‘try a hijab on’ booth at my college campus,” Zhu wrote as a freshman in February 2018. “So you’re telling me that it’s now just a fashion accessory and not a religious thing? Or are you just trying to get women used to being oppressed under Islam?”
In the other tweet mentioned by MWA, Zhu wrote, “Did you know that the majority of black deaths are caused by other blacks? Fix Problems within your own community first before blaming others.”
The Miss World America organisation demanded that Zhu remove any mention of herself as a participant from social media, including photos of her wearing the Miss World America Michigan sash and crown.
“Therefore, and effective immediately, MWA does not recognise you as a participant of any sort or in any capacity as it relates to any and all events of MWA,” MWA Michigan director Laurie DeJack wrote.
Zhu does not seem to be too upset about the pageant’s decision.
“I am glad this story came to light because this is more than just some beauty pageant, this is about the prejudice views against people with ‘different opinions,’” Zhu wrote.
