Sunday evening in Orlando, Florida, Madison Marsh, a 22-year-old second lieutenant in the United States Air Force and master’s candidate in the public policy program at the Harvard Kennedy School, was crowned the winner of the 2024 Miss America competition. Marsh obtained the national title as the inaugural active-duty Air Force officer, representing the state of Colorado.
Texas’ Ellie Breaux finished in the first-place position.
A total of fifty-one contestants, representing all fifty states and the District of Columbia, took part in the event.
After three evenings of preliminary competitions, the pageant commenced. The field was reduced to eleven semi-finalists prior to the main event, of which ten were selected by the preliminary judges and one was determined by a public ballot accessible to pageant enthusiasts and followers throughout the United States.
The five finalists were then determined after these eleven women competed in four rounds of competition: a fitness showcase (a runway walk in rhinestone-encrusted athleisure); a “hot topics” discussion round, which substituted a diverse set of talking points for the pageant’s customary Q&A; a talent performance; and an evening gown presentation. Marsh and Breaux were succeeded in the final rankings by Cydney Bridges of Indiana, Mallory Hudson of Kentucky, and Caroline Parente of Rhode Island, who finished as the second, third, and fourth runners-up, respectively.
Marsh illustrated her response to the subject of “drugs in America” during the discussion round that followed, which covered a range of topics such as nutrition, climate change, technology, and terrorism, by relating the ordeal of her late mother with pancreatic cancer. She performed a spoken-word performance in the talent round that focused on obtaining a pilot’s license at the age of sixteen.
