In Sunday night's Miss USA pageant, Chelsea Hardin, Miss Hawaii USA, was asked in the question-and-answer round if she planned on voting for Donald Trump or Hillary Clinton. And boy, was the audience not pleased with that question--they immediately began booing Laura Brown (executive editor of Harper's BAZAAR), who asked the question.
Hardin didn't really give a straight answer, and effectively punted the question. She said that gender shouldn't matter in this election, and that it was important that the president represent people who feel as though they don't have a voice.
Brown took to Twitter to both defend herself and to congratulate Hardin on her answer. Brown did not come up with the question herself, and she thought Miss Hawaii USA did a great job answering.
Hi guys. I asked the question I was given and Miss Hawaii answered beautifully. @MissUSA ??
— Laura Brown (@laurabrown99) June 6, 2016
To Hardin's credit, that was a loaded and unfair question for a pageant, especially one with a history of penalizing people for having conservative beliefs--she answered about as well as someone could expect given the situation. There was no "correct" answer to that question. Plus, Trump used to own the Miss USA pageant--one would think/hope organizers would avoid trying to put the contestants into an awkward spot, but I guess not.
Miss Hawaii USA advanced to the final three and was first runner up to Miss District of Columbia USA.
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