Mississippi’s state auditor, Shad White, does not have the authority to try to recover misspent welfare funds through litigation, the Mississippi Supreme Court ruled on Thursday. The unanimous opinion affirmed that Mississippi Attorney General Lynn Fitch has the sole right to pursue lawsuits to recover the funds, including interest that White says former NFL quarterback Brett Favre owes the state.
“Now that the court has ruled that Lynn Fitch has the sole authority to file suit to get misspent taxpayer money back, I can only assume the Attorney General will now change course and begin to aggressively fight in court for the recovery of all the welfare money,” White said in a statement from his office on Thursday. “Maybe she will fight as hard to do that as she fought to stop me from recovering the money. Mississippi taxpayers deserve nothing less.”
While Fitch has not pursued criminal cases in the welfare scandal, leaving that instead to local and federal prosecutors, her office has sought to claw back $77 million in funds from dozens of defendants, including Favre, in a massive civil lawsuit.
Auditor Accused Fitch of Disinterest in Welfare Case
In 2021, State Auditor Shad White referred Brett Favre, former NFL player Marcus DuPree, retired pro-wrestlers Ted DiBiase Sr., Ted DiBiase Jr., Brett DiBiase, former Mississippi Department of Human Services Director John Davis and others to Fitch’s office to recover misspent welfare funds, including interest.
White investigated the welfare scandal, which saw $77 million in Temporary Assistance for Needy Families funds diverted to improper uses. Favre received $1.1 million in TANF funds to record promotional material for a nonprofit in 2017. The lawsuit claimed that “Favre voluntarily repaid all the funds,” but while he did pay back $500,000 in May 2020 after news of the welfare scandal broke, the sports celebrity did not repay the remaining $600,000 until after White issued a demand letter for it in late 2021.
Favre did not pay back an additional $228,000 in interest the auditor demanded and is a target of the state’s sweeping civil lawsuit over the welfare scandal, including for other TANF spending related to projects he favored. Those projects included a volleyball stadium at his alma mater and a concussion drug company in which he was heavily invested.
Favre has said he did not know any of the funds he or the projects he backed received came from welfare funds. He has denied all wrongdoing, and prosecutors have not charged him with a crime. Favre filed a defamation lawsuit against White in February 2023, and Fitch’s office withdrew her representation of White in that case in 2024, citing the auditor’s criticisms of her in his book, “Mississippi Swindle.” In the book, he characterizes her as uninterested in pursuing the welfare case; Fitch’s office has not been involved in any of the prosecutions since the scandal came to light in 2020. White has publicly referred to the attorney general as “Lazy Lynn.”
In May 2022, Fitch filed a lawsuit in Hinds County Circuit Court on behalf of the Mississippi Department of Human Services against 38 defendants. Branning noted in her opinion that it included “the three defendants named by the auditor (collectively, ‘the Favre defendants’).”
“On December 13, 2022, the attorney general filed an amended complaint against the Favre defendants. But the amount sought in the amended complaint did not include the statutory interest as contained in the auditor’s original demand,” Branning’s ruling continued. “According to the attorney general, the decision to exclude the statutory interest in the amended complaint was a legal strategy, and she reserved the right to prosecute for it in a potential future lawsuit. The AG’s TANF action is currently pending in the circuit court,” Branning continued.
Before White’s office exposed the welfare scandal alongside Hinds County District Attorney Jody Owens, Fitch and Favre filmed television ads as part of a campaign to encourage Mississippians to stay at home during the COVID-19 pandemic in spring 2020.
Ted DiBiase Sr. has not been accused of a crime in the welfare scandal, though he and his Christian ministry are targets in the State’s civil lawsuit. A jury acquitted Ted DiBiase Jr. on federal charges related to the welfare scandal in March. Brett DiBiase pleaded guilty to crimes in 2023 in exchange for a plea deal. Davis pleaded guilty to federal charges in 2022 and served as a witness at Ted DiBiase Jr.’s trial earlier this year.
So far, only one person has been sentenced for crimes in the Mississippi welfare scandal: a judge sentenced Anne McGrew, an accountant for a nonprofit tied to the scandal, to one year in prison last month.
‘The Auditor Will Audit’
Attorney General Lynn Fitch and State Auditor Shad White’s fight over who can sue to recover welfare funds has been ongoing for years.
Hinds County Chancellor J. Dewayne Thomas ruled in November 2024 that the state auditor could instigate a lawsuit, while the attorney general would be in charge of prosecuting the case. Fitch appealed that decision to the Mississippi Supreme Court.
Justices heard arguments in January of this year in which the attorney general’s lawyers said she should have the sole authority to instigate and lead lawsuits on behalf of the State of Mississippi, while White’s lawyers contended that he should be able to initiate cases and turn them over to Fitch to handle.
“Because the chancery court’s order breaks new ground as a total departure from the legislatively prescribed role of the auditor, we reverse the orders of the chancery court. Accordingly, we render judgment here that the attorney general possesses, and the auditor lacks, the authority to prosecute and to manage litigation seeking the recovery of state money under Sections 7-5-1 and 7-7-211(g),” Justice Jenifer Branning wrote in her opinion of the case, quoting the Mississippi Constitution.
Mississippi Constitution Section 7-5-1 describes the duties of the state’s attorney general, including the notion that “No arm or agency of the state government shall bring or defend a suit against another arm or agency without prior written approval of the Attorney General.”
Mississippi Constitution Section 7-7-211(g), which details the duties of the state auditor, does not include authority to instigate or prosecute cases.
“The attorney general must be an attorney, and the auditor has no such requirement,” Branning wrote.
In response to a request for comment, Fitch’s office pointed only to the ruling itself, specifically page 10, paragraph 24. That section notes that the attorney general has “the sole power to bring or defend a lawsuit filed on behalf of a state agency” and says the justices found “a common-sense separation of duties as prescribed by the Legislature that the auditor will audit and that the attorney general will litigate.”
Follow the Mississippi Free Press’ coverage of the DiBiase trial and the Mississippi welfare scandal and read past stories here.
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