DETROIT (AP) - The Miss World America organization has stripped its Michigan pageant winner of her title, which she says was because of tweets she made about Muslims and black people.

Kathy Zhu was crowned the pageant's Michigan winner last week. She's a University of Michigan conservative who's active with a group called Chinese Americans for Trump.

In since-deleted tweets from the last two years, Zhu alluded to Muslim women wearing hijabs as "being oppressed under Islam" and disparaged black people for "blaming others" in regard to crime. After being stripped of her crown, she posted a letter online in which pageant officials described her tweets as "offensive" and "inappropriate."

Miss World America's State/National/Chief Director accused me of being racist, Islamaphobic, and insensitive.

They stripped me of my Miss Michigan title due to my refusal to try on a hijab in 2018, my tweet about black on black gun violence, and "insensitive" statistical tweets. pic.twitter.com/K1Btho0Pgq

— Kathy Zhu (@PoliticalKathy) July 19, 2019

Zhu calls the decision discriminatory and defends the tweets. Pageant officials didn't respond to a Sunday message seeking comment.

It's unclear who'll represent Michigan in Miss World America's October competition in Las Vegas. Miss World America is separate from the more widely-known Miss America contest.