The official Team Trump twitter account welcomed her on Thursday, calling her a "patriot who has continued to stand for American values despite being stripped of her crown."
"I am so excited to now be part of the #WomenforTrump Coalition Advisory Board!" Zhu tweeted along with the announcement. "Let's get Trump re-elected for 2020."
I am so excited to now be part of the #WomenforTrump Coalition Advisory Board!
— Kathy Zhu (@PoliticalKathy) July 26, 2019
Let’s get Trump re-elected for 2020 🇺🇸😁 https://t.co/uhdBfdInlh
Speaking at a Women for Trump event in Bloomfield Hills, Michigan Friday, Zhu said, cited by CBS, that being openly conservative is extremely difficult, "harder, I think, than coming out as, honestly, gay."
The announcement came shortly after Zhu, a University of Michigan student and president of her campus' College Republicans chapter, posted about the Miss World America pageant's decision to strip her of her title.
Miss World America's State/National/Chief Director accused me of being racist, Islamaphobic, and insensitive.
— Kathy Zhu (@PoliticalKathy) July 19, 2019
They stripped me of my Miss Michigan title due to my refusal to try on a hijab in 2018, my tweet about black on black gun violence, and "insensitive" statistical tweets. pic.twitter.com/K1Btho0Pgq
The letter from the pageant removing her from her position, which she shared on Twitter last week, suggested that her social media accounts contained “offensive, insensitive and inappropriate content” and that Zhu no longer met the requirement of "being in good character.”
According to the screenshots posted by the Orlando Sentinel, the tweets, now deleted, that led to the letter contained statements regarding the black and Muslim communities. In one tweet Zhu suggested that the “try the hijab on” booth at her college campus was an attempt to get “women used to being oppressed under Islam” and in another suggested that “the majority of black deaths are caused by other blacks.” The tweets were sent in 2017 and 2018 respectively.
Since receiving the letter, Zhu has been outspoken about the incident, indicating that the pageant overlooked critical context surrounding her posts and pushed back by accusing beauty pageant of disqualifying contestants because of their opinions.
“Everything that I’ve posted was my statistics and opinions, and I think that we should be empowering women’s voices and not just stripping them of their title only because of their opinions,” she said during an interview with CNN.
