UPDATE, Dec. 9, 3:46 p.m. ET:
Miss Universe has confirmed that Harvey was correct in his announcement. Miss Universe Philippines Gazini Ganados how the costume award, as Harvey announced. Miss Universe Malaysia Shweta Sekhon entered the stage at the wrong moment, leading to confusion. Full details can be found here.
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Original Story:
Steve Harvey did it again. The Miss Universe host was at the center of another slip-up during the 2019 Miss Universe pageant on Sunday. On stage, Harvey was set to announce the winner of the national costume contest. With Miss Malaysia next to him, Harvey was caught off-guard when a photo of Miss Philippines was shown on screen. Seeing it, he announced, “This is it right here.”
That’s when he introduced the woman next to him, who wasn’t the one shown on screen. Shweta Sekhon, Miss Malaysia, corrected him when he gave her the mic. “It’s not Philippines, it’s Malaysia,” she said.
“Let me explain something to you,” Harvey began. “I just read that in the teleprompter. Ya’ll got to quit doing this to me. I can read… Now they are trying to fix it now. See? This is what they did to me back in 2015 — played me short like that.”
I’m glad Steve Harvey called out @MissUniverse pageant for their error on the teleprompter regarding Miss Malaysia; completely avoiding the repetition of what happened to Miss Colombia during @MissUniverse pageant in 2015
— Nzumbe-Nkede (@ivo_nkede) December 9, 2019
The mistake was not at the same capacity of his infamous 2015 mix-up when he announced the wrong winner. He stated that Miss Columbia was the winner when it was actually Miss Philippines.
He regained himself after the teleprompter hiccup, telling Miss Malaysia that he was a big fan of her costume. Eventually, she shared the background behind the details and meaning of what she was wearing.
Harvey, who is in his fifth consecutive year as a host for the competition, was a trending item on social media throughout the evening. Many of those comments had to do with his outfit choice.
The Family Feud host had viewers fixated on his green jacket get-up.
“Steve Harvey should give that suit to Elton John! Not a good look,” one fan wrote on Twitter.
This year’s pageant saw 90 entrants entered into the running. Among them were the debuts of contestants from Bangladesh and Equatorial Guinea. Cheslie Kryst, 28, of Charlotte, North Carolina represented the U.S. this year and made the top 10.
The event marked the 68th installment of Miss Universe. Heading into Sunday night, the reigning title holder was Catriona Gray of the Philippines. Along with Harvey serving as host, Vanessa Lachey and Olivia Culpo assisted in the production behind the scenes.
