Alma Cooper always dreamed of competing at Miss USA.
Alberto E. Rodriguez/Getty Images
“Pageants were like the Super Bowl in my household,” Cooper told Business Insider after she won the Miss USA title in August. “This really all started from watching at home and being inspired by other women who have walked that same stage.”
Cooper’s mother had competed in the Miss America system, paying for pageant fees with money she made teaching dance classes. When Cooper decided to compete at Miss Michigan Teen USA, she followed her mother’s example.
“I got a job at Auntie Anne’s, the pretzel shop, so I could pay my own pageant fees because I wanted to compete so badly,” Cooper said. “I didn’t have a coach or anything.”
Cooper bought her dress for Miss Michigan Teen USA 2016 on Facebook Marketplace. The second year she competed, in 2017, she placed first runner-up.
Cooper held onto her pageant dreams while attending West Point, the US Military Academy.
Courtesy of Miss USA
The pageant queen told BI that she went to West Point with a vision board with pictures of former Miss Michigan USA winners. She wanted to be the first active-duty Army officer to win the competition.
Cooper, a second lieutenant and military intelligence officer, graduated in the top 5% of her class in 2023.
Courtesy of Alma Cooper
Cooper is now a Knight-Hennessy Scholar at Stanford University, where she’s pursuing a master’s degree in data science.
“Being at West Point, it built my character,” Cooper said. “It’s a place where every single person is committed to a culture of excellence, to being part of something bigger than themselves.”
“I carry that with me throughout every aspiration and pursuit that I go through — whether that be at Stanford, whether that be an officer in the Army, whether that be at Miss USA,” she added.
Cooper believes courage is an essential part of the military and pageantry.
Courtesy of Alma Cooper
“Being able to be intrinsically motivated, to have personal courage, is one of the Army values,” she said. “And to get onstage in front of millions of people, a nationally televised audience, and wear a swimsuit — that, in and of itself, is one way to display personal courage and believe in oneself.”
Cooper won the Miss USA 2024 competition on August 4, becoming the first Afro-Latina woman to take the title.
Gilbert Flores/Variety via Getty Images
During the interview round, Cooper, who represented Michigan at the pageant, discussed her unique journey to the Miss USA stage.
“As the daughter of a migrant worker, a proud Afro-Latina woman, and an officer of the United States Army, I’m living the American dream,” Cooper said during the competition. “If there’s anything that my life and my mother have taught me, it’s that your circumstances never define your destiny.”
Cooper later told BI that she wants to use her platform as Miss USA to uplift “the voices of individuals whose stories may not be heard, whose stories may not be shown.”
“I think the biggest thing that can be taken away from my story is that if you are someone who wants to do it all, you truly can,” she added. “There are no limits on yourself except the ones that you accept.”
Cooper won the Miss USA title following a tumultuous year for the organization.
Alberto E. Rodriguez/Getty Images
Cooper was crowned by Savannah Gankiewicz, who assumed the title of Miss USA 2023 after Noelia Voigt resigned in May.
Both Voigt and Miss Teen USA 2023 UmaSofia Srivastava relinquished their crowns in the same week. It was the first time a winner had given up her title in the pageant’s 72-year history.
Following their resignations, BI spoke to over a dozen people connected to Miss USA and Miss Teen USA about the controversy and how CEO Laylah Rose’s leadership has impacted the organization.
Despite the scandal, Cooper has publicly praised Voigt and Srivastava.
“I’ve been really grateful to receive support and encouragement from Noelia and Uma,” she told Today.com in September. “That’s really meant a lot to me.”
