ATLANTIC CITY, N.J. -- The top leadership of the Miss America Organization, implicated in an email scandal that targeted past pageant winners for abuse based on their appearance, intellect and sex lives, resigned on Saturday, with the outgoing president apologizing to a winner whose weight he ridiculed.
The president, Josh Randle, said his comment responding to an email to his private account about the physical appearance of 2013 winner Mallory Hagan came months before he started working for the Miss America Organization in 2015. But he said it was wrong.
"I apologize to Mallory for my lapse in judgment," Randle said Saturday. "It does not reflect my values or the values I worked to promote at the Miss America Organization. Although this terrible situation was not caused or driven by me, in light of recent events and new developments, I am no longer willing to continue in my capacity as president and earlier today offered my resignation to the MAO Board of Directors."
Randle said his resignation was voluntary and had not been requested by the board of Miss America.
Hagan did not immediately respond to a message seeking comment on the resignations. But on her Facebook page, she posted a message asking anyone who was warned away from her to come forward and send her a direct message.
Randle was one of three top Miss America officials to resign Saturday over the scandal, which began Thursday when the Huffington Post published leaked emails showing pageant officials ridiculing past Miss Americas.
The emails included one that used a vulgar term for female genitalia to refer to past Miss America winners, one that wished that a particular former Miss America had died and others that speculated about how many sex partners Hagan has had.
Randle noted that the worst communications were exchanged in 2013 and 2014, years before he joined the Miss America Organization, and said the article's implication of "complicit participation on my part in a years long array of inappropriate email communication" is untrue.
CEO Sam Haskell and Chairman Lynn Weidner also resigned on Saturday. Haskell's resignation is effective immediately, while Randle and Weidner will remain for a few weeks to help with a leadership transition. Dan Meyers, who had been vice chairman of the board, was named interim chairman.
The organization announced the resignations a day after dozens of former Miss Americas, including Hagan, signed a petition calling on the group's leadership to step down because of the emails. Among them were a pair of former Miss Americas from Arkansas.
Lamenting the "sickening and egregious words used by Miss America leadership," the 49 women condemned "ongoing efforts to divide our sisterhood" and called for the resignation of four top pageant officials, including Haskell and lead telecast writer Lewis Friedman.
"We stand firmly against harassment, bullying and shaming -- especially of women -- through the use of derogatory terms meant to belittle and demean," they wrote. "As Miss Americas, we strongly reject the mischaracterizations of us both collectively and individually."
Savvy Shields, a student at the University of Arkansas, Fayetteville who won the Miss America Pageant in 2016, was the most recent winner to add her name to the letter. In a Facebook post praising former Miss Americas who had "championed empowerment of women everywhere," the Fayetteville native explained her own decision to sign.
"I stand in support of these brave women who have competed and volunteered in this organization and I stand against all forms of degradation, shaming, and disrespecting women," she wrote. "The last 24 hours have been heartbreaking, but knowing this organization is so much bigger than the people who lead it gives me great hope for its future."
Elizabeth Gracen, an Arkansan who won the competition in 1982, also signed her name to petition. Neither she nor Shields responded to requests for comment.
"I am proud to stand with them," Gracen wrote on her Facebook account. "Change is in the air!"
The emails already cost the pageant its television production partner and raised questions about the future of the nationally televised broadcast from Atlantic City's Boardwalk Hall the week after Labor Day each year. Dick Clark Productions said Thursday that it cut ties with the Miss America Organization over the emails, calling them "appalling."
Also on Saturday, one of the main recipients of fundraising from the Miss America Organization, the Children's Miracle Network Hospitals, said it was reviewing its association with Miss America.
And New Jersey officials are reviewing their Miss America Organization contract, in which the state still owes $4 million toward the cost of next year's pageant.
Information for this article was contributed by Wayne Parry of The Associated Press and by Kally Patz of Arkansas Online.
A Section on 12/24/2017