(LifeSiteNews) — A beauty pageant queen from Florida has been stripped of her crown due to her unwillingness to affirm “that little boys could become girls.”

Kayleigh Bush, who was crowned Miss North Florida in September 2024, says the Miss America organization issued her a new contract later that year that included language affirming eligible applicants must be “Female.”

However, the new agreement defined this term as, “a born female or an individual who has fully completed Sex Reassignment Surgery via Vaginoplasty (from male to female) with supporting medical documentation and records.”

Bush says that, since she could not in good conscience agree “that a little boy could mutilate his body and become a woman” and thus declined to sign the new agreement, the organization stripped her of her crown.

“I was asked to sign a contract that was different than the first one that I had agreed to because they had changed it four weeks after I rightly won,” Bush told TMZ. “And so I didn’t lose my crown because I broke a rule. I lost the crown because I was unwilling to rewrite the truth.”

Miss North Florida winner: “I could not agree a little boy could become a woman.”

Kayleigh Bush speaks out after her crown was revoked. pic.twitter.com/hqlDqoY2nh

— LifeSiteNews (@LifeSite) February 12, 2026

Upon receiving the contract, Bush says she and her mother immediately raised concerns.

“(We) got on a conference call immediately with one of the directors for the Miss America organization,” said the 20-year-old. “And weeks and weeks of pleading with them, sending videos, sending letters, emails, demand letters through Liberty Council—because they picked up my case—and they just (said) ‘no, no, no,’ and they doubled down.”

Responding to the story, a Miss America spokesperson told TMZ, “Miss America’s position is grounded in uniform application of its rules, fairness to all contestants, and adherence to nondiscrimination principles. The contract does not compel Ms. Bush to compromise her personal beliefs; it requires only that all contestants compete under the same standards and refrain from discriminatory conduct towards others.”

In her interview, Bush smiled recalling the public figures who have extended support to her including Riley Gaines and Leigh-Allyn Baker, and “the famous Miss Liz Doyle,” foundress of She Leads America. This organization crowned the young pageant winner their first Miss She Leads America and honored her as their 2025 Young Christian Woman of Distinction.

Yet, despite such generous encouragement and support, Bush said it was a difficult experience.

“It was heartbreaking, it was confusing, it was disappointing, because Miss America has been honoring women for over 100 years,” she explained.  “And now they can’t even define what a woman is.”

“I used to look up to Miss America because they empowered women, but now it’s really disappointing to see that they’ve abandoned such a common-sense truth—that a man is a man and that a woman is a woman” Bush said. “(I’m) disappointed in the Miss America organization but I’m really hoping that they get back on track and return to truth and you know start honoring God in their pageants like they used to.”

And beaming wearing her Miss She Leads America sash, the pageant queen affirmed that the ordeal caused her to do “a lot of soul searching,” but in the end she realized “God uses all things for good, and here I am.”