Election Deniers?

R'Bonney Gabriel

At NYPo, Contestants claim Miss USA 2022 was ‘rigged’: ‘We were humiliated’

Were Miss USA pageant-goers miss-led this year?

“Humiliated” contestants claim the 2022 Miss USA pageant was “rigged” and that the winner of the contest, Miss Texas R’Bonney Gabriel, was predetermined — or so say theories circulating TikTok, which claim no one had a “fair chance.”

Miss Montana Heather Lee O’Keefe fired up the rumor mill online following the contest on Monday, when Gabriel, 28, was crowned — which made her the first Filipina American to win the Miss USA title. She’s also the first Asian American contestant to earn the Miss Texas USA state title. 

Heather Lee O'Keefe

“Most of the Miss USA contestants feel very strongly that there was favoritism towards Miss Texas USA and we have the receipts to prove it,” O’Keefe claimed in a TikTok video with over 29,000 views.

Miss New York Heather Nunez wrote on her personal account’s Instagram Stories that she was “humiliated” and thought everyone had a “fair chance.”

“I am lost for words,” she wrote. “The way I entered this pageant and gave it every last bit of my heart and soul… We were humiliated, thinking we entered something with a fair chance.”

Heather Nunez

Nunez said she’s “not here to create a sob story” and said people “don’t have to believe what we are saying.”

“The ONLY reason I am speaking up is to prevent future contestants from feeling the way that I do,” she wrote. “For all the little girls who watch Miss USA with the same dreams I had of working hard to be in that position. You deserve a fair chance.”

 

[UPDATE: Miss Universe has launched an investigation into claims made by contestants after The Post’s report and Miss USA has denied the contest was “rigged.”]

They're all winners in my eyes.