Addie Carver of Mississippi was named Miss Teen USA on Thursday, assuming a title that has stood vacant since the previous winner’s highly controversial resignation in May.
The 17-year-old dance teacher, cheerleader and choreographer was crowned at a glitzy Los Angeles event that organizers hope will draw a line under a tumultuous three months for the contest and its companion event, Miss USA.
Prior to accepting the tiara, Carver had told judges of her earlier mental health struggles, adding: “As the next Miss Teen USA I want to make it my mission to know that every little girl who is just like me once is never alone.” Georgia’s Ava Colindres and Arizona’s Rachael Mclaen were named first and second runners-up.
The finale featured no explicit references to this year’s shock double resignation, which saw 2023’s Miss USA and Miss Teen USA — Utah’s Noelia Voigt and New Jersey’s UmaSofia Srivastava, respectively — become the first winners of either contest to ever renege their crowns. Voigt initially cited mental health reasons, though various criticisms of organizers later emerged, while Srivastava attributed her decision to a clash in “personal values” with the Miss USA organization.
The controversy heralded one significant change to Thursday’s proceedings: Breaking with years of tradition, Carver was presented with her tiara not by last year’s winner but by Hawaii’s Savannah Gankiewicz, who inherited the Miss USA crown following Voigt’s resignation. Although Voigt did not provide further details at the time, internet commenters spotted that the first letter in each sentence of her cryptic Instagram post, which announced her resignation, spelled “I am silenced,” sparking rumors that a non-disclosure agreement may have kept her from elaborating.
Her resignation letter, later obtained by CNN, contained a litany of complaints against organizers. In it, she alleged delays in receiving prizes and a “toxic work environment” that “at best, is poor management and, at worst, is bullying and harassment.” She also claimed to have been sexually harassed during a public appearance due the organization’s failure to provide an “effective handler.”
Days later, Carver’s predecessor, Srivastava, followed suit, giving up the Miss Teen USA title saying that her personal values “no longer fully align with the direction of the organization.” She has not publicly commented further, though her mother, Barbara Srivastava, appeared on Good Morning America saying both beauty queens had been “ill-treated, abused, bullied and cornered,” and that “the job of their dreams turned out to be a nightmare.”
Organizers and the pageants’ parent company, the Miss Universe Organization, did not respond to CNN’s requests for comment at the time of the double resignation. Miss USA president Laylah Rose released a statement at the end of May, reported by the Los Angeles Times, refuting Voigt’s allegations. Unlike in Miss USA, the teen competition’s first runner-up, Stephanie Skinner, declined to take on the title, which instead remained vacant.
— CutC by Cnn.com
