Justus Kelley, Miss Virginia USA 2026, won the 75th Miss USA pageant on Aug. 27 at the Adrienne Arsht Center for the Performing Arts in Miami-Dade County. The 31-year-old married mother made history as the first winner to hold all three distinctions: mother, married woman, and contestant in her 30s.
The victory marks a sharp departure from decades of pageant tradition. In 2023, the Miss USA organization scrapped restrictions that barred mothers and women over 28 from competing, opening the competition to all women 18 and older.
Kelley won a prize package valued at more than $685,000, including a $150,000 salary, a Range Rover, a one-year luxury apartment lease in Miami, a Westgate Vacation Home Club membership and $30,000 in wardrobe for the Miss Universe competition.
Beyond the pageant, Kelley founded Foster Footprints, an organization supporting foster youth in the Washington, D.C. area. She and her husband, Tyler, are licensed foster parents in Virginia and have taken in children ranging from 7 months to 10 years old over 13 years.
In an Aug. 20 interview with People, Kelley said she and her college sweetheart shared early dreams of fostering. "We wanted every child who came through our doors to know that they were safe, valued and worthy of being loved exactly as they are," she told the magazine.
The couple currently foster a baby boy and his sister. Kelley said the biological family has been an "incredible partner" in the arrangement and asked them to be the children's godparents.
She stressed that the goal of foster care is always reunification with the biological family and that she and her husband aim to "continue to be a source of stability and comfort for any child who needs it throughout their journey."
Kelley's win is the first Miss USA title for a Virginia contestant since 1970.
