As the third owner of Miss USA in the last five years, Thom Brodeur knows he has a lot to prove.
The nearly 75-year-old pageant has weathered endless scandals recently, from rigging and bullying allegations to a Miss USA and Miss Teen USA resigning for the first time in its history.
Brodeur sat down with Business Insider for his first interview since he was announced as the new CEO and president of the brand. He revealed three big changes are coming to the Miss USA 2025 pageant, which will take place in Reno, Nevada, on October 24.
“My team knows we have a lot of work to do,” Brodeur said. “We have trust to rebuild, we have faith to restore, and we have healing to begin.”
No more NDAs
When Noelia Voigt and UmaSofia Srivastava resigned as Miss USA and Miss Teen USA in May 2024, they said they couldn’t publicly disclose many details because they had signed strict nondisclosure agreements, which were introduced by previous Miss USA CEO Laylah Rose in 2023.
Voigt and Srivastava’s mothers spoke up for pageant queens instead, telling Business Insider at the time that their daughters had endured “eight months of torture and abuse” under Rose’s leadership — allegations she denied in an open letter shared in May 2024. Rose hasn’t responded to Business Insider’s repeated requests for comment.
In her official Miss USA resignation letter, Voigt detailed the “detrimental mental and emotional toll” of her time as Miss USA, saying that she had been prescribed two anxiety medications due to Rose’s constant harassment.
“I’ve never ever in my life been on anti-anxiety medication,” Voigt told Business Insider in August. “I felt like I had to put on a facade to represent the organization because I had this title, but I didn’t agree with what was going on.”
When he announced that he was taking over Miss USA, Brodeur said he would eliminate the restrictive contracts and NDAs.
“My view is this: If you have nothing to hide, then don’t,” Brodeur told Business Insider. “I think this organization, under previous leadership, spent time hiding, and that only made things worse.”
“If you can take the shackles off a woman’s voice that shouldn’t have had shackles on their voice to begin with, you’ve done good work,” he added. “If people think there’s a better way to do things and they want to express themselves — especially the women who wind up being titleholders for this organization — they should have the opportunity to do so.”
Voigt praised the news that Brodeur was taking over the organization, telling Business Insider at the beginning of September that it was a “new day on the horizon.”
“I genuinely feel like going on my social media right now and telling every girl that has been afraid to compete in the USA system since I resigned to please go ahead and sign up now,” she said.
No more selection committees
Brodeur told Business Insider that he wants to bring more transparency to the judging process by eliminating selection committees, which typically picked the top 15 contestants for the Miss USA national pageant.
“For many, many years, young women have come into this organization competing with a rule — it’s very clearly stated, you know what you’re signing up for in your contestant contract — that the leadership team, management, and others can be part of the selection process,” Brodeur said. “So the process for selecting a new Miss USA and Miss Teen USA isn’t just left up to the judges. That’s how it has historically been.”
“Part of what my team and I intend to do is to remove that selection committee rule out of contestant contracts,” he added. “What that means, very simply, is who the judges pick is the winner of Miss USA and Miss Teen USA. And what that means to the competitors — the young women who compete in this sport — is that they are going to have a 100% fair shot where nobody else’s voice or influence affects their ability to place in the competition.”
Brodeur’s decision comes three years after multiple contestants said that the Miss USA 2022 pageant was rigged in favor of R’Bonney Gabriel, who went on to win Miss Universe in January 2023. Business Insider spoke to many of the 2022 contestants at the time, who said there were multiple conflicts of interest between Gabriel and Miss USA’s national sponsors.
The Miss Universe Organization, which oversees the Miss USA pageant, suspended then-president Crystle Stewart following the allegations in October 2022. In August 2023, the organization announced that Stewart had been cleared by a third-party investigation but was parting ways with Miss USA. Rose was announced as her successor hours later.
Political questions are back
When Rose took over Miss USA, one of her first changes was eliminating interview questions involving politics or current events.
“The final question is going to be really catered to them as an individual,” Rose told Business Insider in September 2023. “It won’t be a political question. I want to highlight them as individuals, and I really want them to shine within themselves and who they are.”
These questions became a hallmark of the Miss USA competition under former Miss Universe president Paula Shugart, who produced the Miss USA pageant from 2001 until 2020.
Contestants were encouraged to watch the news and read “The Great American Citizenship Quiz” book to prepare for hard-hitting questions on the Miss USA stage. Past winners like Olivia Culpo, Cheslie Kryst, and Asya Branch discussed transgender rights, the Me Too movement, and the Second Amendment during their interview rounds.
Rose’s rule change baffled many past Miss USA contestants, including Miss Utah 2020 Rachel Slawson, the first openly bisexual woman to compete at Miss USA.
“Most women get into pageantry because they feel like there’s a voice that’s missing,” Slawson told Business Insider in July 2024. “Taking that away from women is just really watering them down, and very disappointing when you spend so many years working to have a platform and have your voice heard.”
Brodeur told Business Insider there will be no such restrictions at Miss USA going forward.
“It’s entirely possible there will be questions about sensitive topics that matter to the constituents and the communities that these young women represent,” Brodeur said. “There is nothing that is being restricted or limited in that way.”
“We’re not just all talking about our favorite colors, movies, or songs,” he added. “So I think it’s important that we allow the intelligence of the women in the Miss USA and Teen USA communities to shine.”
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