UPDATE: Click here to find out how McAllen’s Miss Texas USA did in the Miss USA event.
McAllen native Victoria Hinojosa will be competing in the 70th annual Miss USA pageant tonight.
Hinojosa, who was crowned Miss Texas USA 2021 in September, will compete against 50 other contestants representing each state and the District of Columbia. The pageant will be aired live on the FYI Network at 7 p.m. from the Paradise Cove Theater of the River Spirit Casino Resort in Tulsa, Oklahoma.
Miss Texas USA 2021 is a 2015 graduate of McAllen Memorial High School and an alumni of Texas A&M University.
Following her victory in September, Hinojosa said her sights were set on tonight’s Miss USA pageant, as well as the Miss Universe pageant in Eilat, Israel.
“I’m locked in. I’m ready,” Hinojosa said. “I think that I really prepared for Miss Texas USA, so I’m really just in a stage of maintaining where I’m at and polishing up my interview skills and, like healthwise — just continuing to workout and eat clean, and really focusing on using my voice. More than anything, that’s what I wanted to do with my title. Leading up to Miss USA, that’s what I’m going to continue to do.”
She said that she hopes to inspire young girls and boys from the Rio Grande Valley to continue striving for their dreams.
“I hope to be a role model to that person that doesn’t believe in themself to continue chasing their dreams no matter how big they are,” she said. “I hope that they see me and what I’ve done and look up to me and do the same thing. That’s really what I hope to get out of it. I think being from the Rio Grande Valley, sometimes we put ourselves in this little bubble. We don’t think that we can go that far. We think our dream is too big.
“I want to really encourage — especially our impressionable youth — that there is no dream that is too big, especially with hard work and dedication. Anything is possible.”
The Valley’s youth will be able to watch Hinojosa live her dream tonight on the FYI Network or on Hulu.
