First Asian American Miss Texas has message for Gov. Greg Abbott on diversity: 'Y'all means all'

Bishop, who was second runner-up in last year’s Miss America contest, serves on the Dallas mayor’s anti-hate advisory council and recently starred in a Fort Worth production of the musical “Miss Saigon” with the Filipino-born actor Lou Diamond Phillips.

Bishop recently lobbied lawmakers against a bill that bans diversity, equity, and inclusion departments in public universities—a program she says she benefited from as an undergraduate and law student at Southern Methodist University, home of the George W. Bush Presidential Library. The bill, signed into law by Gov. Greg Abbott last month, makes Texas the second state in the country after Florida to ban such programs in public higher education.

Bishop disclosed these details in an opinion piece for MSNBC on Saturday, a week after her tenure as Miss Texas ended. She said Texas leaders were “living in denial” by trying to “smother” diversity rather than “celebrating (it) and the ways it makes us stronger.” Instead of being “a shining example” for other states, Texas risks “becoming a national embarrassment.”

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