A Florida beauty queen who lost her crown for her biblical views on gender was honored in Washington, DC earlier this month. In August 2024, Kayleigh Bush was crowned as Miss North Florida 2025. However, when she was asked to sign a contract for the Miss Florida Scholarship program through Miss America, Kayleigh found she didn’t agree with the contract’s definition of female. The contract defined the term “female” as “[A]n individual who has fully completed Sex Reassignment Surgery [sic] via Vaginoplasty (from male to female) [sic] with supporting medical documentation and records” and that “No alternative gender affirming [sic] surgery will suffice as acceptable in place of a Vaginoplasty…” A vaginoplasty would essentially require castration and the mutilation of male genitalia in order to create an artificial vagina.

When Kayleigh, who is a Christian, refused to sign the contract based on her religious convictions, she was subsequently stripped of her title. Liberty Counsel sent a demand letter to the Miss America Organization and the Miss Florida Scholarship Program, Inc. asking that the programs reinstate Kayleigh’s “Miss North Florida” title and allow her to sign a revised contract with a definition of female that did not violate her religious beliefs. “Kayleigh objects to the Contract’s false ‘Female’ definitional language, which was provided after her performance of all other terms and conditions necessary for her to compete for and receive the Miss North Florida title,” Liberty Counsel said in its letter. “On a personal level, Kayleigh objects in part because of her own religious, scientific, political and moral beliefs that sex is immutable; that individuals are born and remain either male or female; that the word ‘Female’ indeed ‘means a born female;’ and that it is offensive to Female dignity to require Females to compete against males claiming to be the opposite sex.”

Neither organization acquiesced to the letter. However, Kayleigh’s commitment to her faith earned her national admiration. Peggy Nienaber, vice president of Faith & Liberty and the director of She Leads America in Washington, D.C. nominated Kayleigh to be recognized with the 2025 Young Christian Woman of Distinction award at She Leads America’s annual gala. “Kayleigh Bush is a young woman of integrity who gave up her crown rather than accept a lie that boys can be girls. The Miss America Organization has lost its way and needs to return to common sense and biological reality,” said Liberty Counsel founder and Chairman Mat Staver. “Miss America has always honored women until now. Forcing women to sign a contract that boys can become girls is an insult to women.”

Rep. Lisa McClain, (R-MI) entered Kayleigh’s name into the Congressional record and called her a modern-day Esther. “Her story reminds us that courage is contagious, truth is not negotiable, and that no earthly crown compares to the one given by Christ,” she said.  “Today, we honor Kayleigh Bush — not just as the Canceled Crown, but as a living testimony of 1 Timothy 4:12: ‘Let no one look down on you because of your youth, but be an example for the believers in speech, in conduct, in love, in faith, and in purity.’’’