Former Miss America Erika Harold criticized recent media coverage of disgraced — and convicted — Theranos founder Elizabeth Holmes, arguing that a New York Times article profiling her “new image” was essentially rewarding her behavior.
Harold, who parlayed her 2003 pageant victory into a Harvard Law degree, critiqued the piece in a Sunday tweet. “We must stop rewarding bad behavior w/clout + clicks. Elizabeth Holmes isn’t being punished b/c she girl bossed ‘too close to the sun.’ She intentionally misled people re a biotechnological device, impacting patients, investors + employees. She doesn’t deserve a phoenix narrative.”
We must stop rewarding bad behavior w/clout + clicks. Elizabeth Holmes isn’t being punished b/c she girl bossed “too close to the sun.” She intentionally misled people re a biotechnological device, impacting patients, investors + employees. She doesn’t deserve a phoenix narrative https://t.co/Vi5yHi6IAd
— Erika Harold (@ErikaHarold) May 7, 2023
She quoted a tweet sharing NYT article — titled “Liz Holmes Wants You to Forget About Elizabeth” — along with the caption, “The black turtlenecks are gone. So is the voice. As the convicted Theranos founder Elizabeth Holmes awaits prison, she has adopted a new persona.”
The “new persona,” according to the article, is “devoted mother” of two young children with partner Billy Evans — and her reinvention comes just ahead of her imminent prison sentence for corporate fraud over Theranos, her blood-testing startup.
The interview, published on Sunday, was conducted at the San Diego Zoo — with Evans and the two children in tow — by the Times’ former reporter-at-large Amy Chozick.
The implication that a transformation has taken place is reinforced by the fact that Holmes, when talking about her time with Theranos, claimed to have not been herself at all but rather a character that she had created.
Responding to Chozick, who told her that actress Jennifer Lawrence had backed out of playing her in a film, Holmes said simply, “They’re not playing me. They’re playing a character I created.”
As to why she believed she “created” that character, Holmes said, “I believed it would be how I would be good at business and taken seriously and not taken as a little girl or a girl who didn’t have good technical ideas. Maybe people picked up on that not being authentic, since it wasn’t.”