JACKSON, Miss.—John Davis, the former head of Mississippi’s welfare agency, once confessed that he “tried to buy all your love” to a pro-wrestler whose companies he sent millions in welfare funds to, text messages revealed in court Friday show.
Davis, who struck a plea deal with prosecutors in 2022, was testifying in the trial of WWE wrestler Ted DiBiase Jr., who faces charges in connection with the sprawling welfare scandal. Ted Jr., often referred to as “Teddy,” is the son of Ted DiBiase Sr., the famed former WWF wrestler popularly known as “The Million Dollar Man.” The State has sued the elder DiBiase over more than $700,000 that Davis directed to his Christian ministry, Heart of David Ministries, but prosecutors have not accused him of a crime.
In federal court in Jackson on Friday, a prosecutor asked Davis whether he had a romantic relationship with Brett DiBiase, the brother of Ted Jr. who previously accepted a plea deal in relation to the scandal. They were among several sports celebrities whom Davis shoveled millions in welfare dollars toward behind 2016 and 2019.
“Mr. Davis,” Assistant U.S. Attorney John Meynardie asked Davis in federal court on Friday, “Were you in love with (Brett DiBiase)? Not agape, but—”
“I had no sexual desire towards Brett,” Davis interjected. Nor did he have any sexual relations with him, attempted or consummated, he added.
What the former Mississippi Department of Human Services director did have was love, he said—a love he found difficult to characterize. Like a brother, he supposed, but more like a son. But Davis had no sons, he admitted, so the shape of the love was indistinct, impossible to define.
That shapeless love is a recurring topic in the State’s ongoing case against DiBiase Jr. Again and again, the state presented text messages depicting the outpouring of emotion from Davis to both DiBiase brothers.
“I love you sooo freakin much I want to be selfish and make you stay right here with me,” Davis wrote to Brett DiBiase in one text message the prosecution presented in court on Friday.
“It’s getting tougher as I ride back I realize how lonely I am,” read another, on January 13, 2019.
‘A Conduit For You to the World’
John Davis worked tirelessly to serve the interests of both DiBiase brothers in his professional endeavors, finding spots for them directly at his side. First Brett, and then Teddy spent long periods as Davis’ right-hand men, attending meetings and working long hours with the MDHS executive.
Eventually, both DiBiases would be moved to positions with MDHS subgrantees, where their salaries would exceed the humble caps that faced state employees.
In exchange, Ted DiBiase Jr. penned paeans of loyalty that bordered on matrimonial.
“ I want to be a conduit for you to the world because God is going to bless generations to come through your life,” DiBiase Jr. wrote to Davis and his brother Brett in December 2017. “That legacy, your legacy has already been set in motion … I declare to you both that I’m partnering with you two only in the things we’ve discussed. On my son and daughter, I will declare that I have zero endeavors that I will commit to pursue, entertain, or even waste five damn minutes of my time indulging with anyone else, even if the president, Pope or Billy Graham himself asked me to consider. No, no, no is my answer.”
Davis fantasized idly about a joint purchase of land that would never materialize, a place he called the “DaViase Farm,” a term Ted DiBiase Jr. coined in his many excitable messages back to Davis.
“He liked to wordsmith, and DaViase was just a derivation of my name and his name together,” Davis said.
“Like Bennifer,” Meynardie offered brusquely, referring to Ben Affleck and Jennifer Lopez.
Their love came with responsibilities, like soothing the anxious spasms of Brett DiBiase, Davis said.
“I was always trying to calm Brett down. He was always ready to go over a cliff,” he explained.
Brett DiBiase pleaded guilty to making fraudulent statements in the TANF scandal in 2020 and to conspiracy to defraud the U.S. government in 2023. Christi Webb, the operator of Tupelo-based Family Resource Center of North Mississippi, an MDHS subgrantee that court documents say directed welfare funds to companies owned by Ted DiBiase Jr., pleaded guilty to theft of federal funds in 2023. None of those charged, including those who have entered into plea agreements, have served sentences thus far.
Soon after Brett DiBiase and Webb entered into plea agreements, prosecutors indicted Ted DiBiase Jr. in April 2023, alleging that his companies, Priceless Ventures LLC and Familiae Orientem LLC, received TANF funds and funds from the Emergency Food Assistance Program to provide social services that the companies never rendered. Instead, U.S. Justice Department officials alleged in an April 2023 statement, Ted DiBiase Jr. “used these federal funds to buy a vehicle and a boat, and for the down payment on the purchase of a house, among other expenditures.”
Ted DiBiase Jr. has denied all 13 counts federal prosecutors charged him with, including wire fraud, conspiracy and theft of federal funds, and is presumed innocent unless proven guilty under the U.S. Constitution.
“As much as every one of us have the right to decide for ourselves whether our government is effective or prudent in the way it carries out its functions, criminalizing what, in hindsight, may be fairly characterized as poor fiscal management by the executive branch of state government is a dangerous and worrisome precedent,” his attorney Scott Gilbert said in a statement to the Associated Press after his arrest.
Contract Awarded to Brett DiBiase Spurred Investigation
Attorneys representing the U.S. government stated that John Davis assisted in four contracts for companies owned by Ted DiBiase Jr., passing along $2.5 million in federal welfare funds intended to assist Mississippi families in need. It was one of the many alleged fraudulent uses of federal funds in a year when Davis “outsourced” tens of millions of dollars from the Temporary Assistance for Needy Families fund to two nonprofits: Families First Resource Center of North Mississippi and Mississippi Community Education Centers.
Millions of dollars went to projects favored by famed NFL quarterback Brett Favre, routed through MCEC. The money funded volleyball projects at his alma mater at a time when his daughter was a volleyball athlete there, and to a concussion drug company that Favre was invested in.
Though he is a target of the state’s civil lawsuit, like Ted DiBiase Sr., Favre is not among those charged with a crime in connection to the welfare scandal. Neither is former Republican Mississippi Gov. Phil Bryant, who appointed Davis in 2016.
Davis pleaded guilty in 2022 to five counts of conspiracy and 13 counts of fraud against the U.S. government. In total, the investigation into MDHS found more than $77 million in welfare funds had been misspent during the disgraced MDHS director’s tenure. Some estimates suggest it’s closer to $100 million.
“One of the main goals as I came into the office was to consolidate, outsource and eliminate as much as is possible within the agency. Including contracts,” Davis told the court on Friday.
“It’s privatization,” he agreed when prompted by the prosecutor. “The administration liked to call it outsourcing because it sounded better.”
Bryant has long denied knowledge of Davis’ misuse of welfare funds. In mid-2019, then-Mississippi Department of Human Services Deputy Director Jacob Black tipped Bryant off about a suspicious contract that Davis had awarded to Brett DiBiase’s company; Bryant then turned the tip over to State Auditor Shad White, kicking off the MDHS welfare investigation.
‘Jesus Can Fill Any of the Gaps’
While much coverage of the welfare scandal since it broke in 2020 has focused on Brett Favre and what Phil Bryant knew, Davis’ personal motivations have largely remained out of the spotlight.
“You and brett and austin hold a very special place in my heart. I want to make sure and do everything I can to help each of you,” says one text message that prosecutors say Davis wrote to Ted DiBiase Jr. sometime between 2017 and 2019.
Austin referred to Austin Smith, a nephew of John Davis who is a target in the State’s civil lawsuit to clawback misspent TANF funds but has not been charged with a crime. In one 2022 filing in the civil suit, Smith’s lawyers alleged that friction later developed as the welfare scandal began to unravel.
In the text to Ted DiBiase Jr., Davis also wrote that there was “a desire (in) my heart to be someone who you can be used as a resource.”
“You’re also right in the fact that Jesus can fill any of the gaps,” Davis continued.
Across the years of collaboration between the DiBiases and Davis, personal and professional, the men frequently invoked religion in their endeavors. The many outlets engineered for MDHS funds—including leadership camps and the teambuilding exercises—were frequently “faith-based” initiatives. That aligned with the Bryant administration’s goals of moving welfare funds from the hands of individuals and shifting it toward more religiously inclined institutions and other organizations.
In the texts, DiBiase Jr. presented himself as a storyteller, an artist of the parable. “Like Jesus,” he wrote to Davis, the pair could tell stories to motivate and shape the leaders of the future.
“God is good and he wants us to smile way more than frown,” Davis wrote.
Beyond the rapturous gospel and enraptured affection, the texts between Davis and the DiBiases evinced a manic devotion to the culture of self-help and positive affirmation. They admired circuit speakers and motivational gurus, aiming to bring their practices into the professional realm of MDHS. Pages and pages of texts presented in court portrayed repetitive sessions of intense mutual admiration.
In one text to Brett DiBiase that prosecutors presented on Friday, Davis discussed what he said was his reason for transferring funds to Ted DiBiase Sr.’s ministry.
“You have to know if the funding stops, Teddys contract stops too,” Davis wrote. “That’s why I transferred the $3 million to (Heart of David Ministries).”
In another text to Brett DiBiase, Davis wrote that he was “guaranteeing you stability for your family for the rest of your life.” Texts also show that the disgraced welfare chief had discussed Ted Jr.’s financial difficulties with him, such as having to pay for baby formula with credit cards and having to sell their home to pay debts.
In one text to Ted DiBiase Jr. on April 12, 2018, Davis wrote about his motivations for helping the brothers.
“It is me who tried to buy all of your love. I even tried to take care of others because that pleased you. I screwed up,” the ex-welfare chief wrote.
On a different occasion, Davis informed DiBiase Jr. that the vicissitudes of state funding had threatened plans they had previously agreed upon.
“ I need your guidance. I am pushing hard on several projects. … The intention was to have (Priceless Ventures LLC) in the middle of it, and I realized I screwed that up,” Davis said. “Should I move forward without priceless or is it too soon for me to ask? I’m just trying not to ever drop the ball again.”
Immediately, the former pro-wrestler’s tone shifted, the texts that prosecutors revealed on Friday showed.
“Is that an ultimatum?” DiBiase Jr. wrote to Davis in 2018. “I honestly would not appreciate, all things considered, being pressured to make some sort of commitment today out of worry or threat that my family could potentially lose out on a future, vision, and security that was sold and promised to me.”
It took little pushback from DiBiase Jr. for Davis to backpedal.
“Anything that I have said we could do is still 100% ongoing,” the MDHS executive responded. “I would never leave you out of anything and I will always be thinking about the future … Sorry my text can sometimes come across in the wrong way.”
‘We Are Going to Build Generational Security for Our Families’
In court on Friday, John Davis recounted two instances where he said he went with Brett DiBiase to acquire drugs, unknowingly at first, he alleged. The second, he said, was the day Brett departed for rehab in California.
“He said he would not get on the plane unless he had one last, in my vernacular, hoorah,” Davis told the court.
Then, Davis directed Nancy New, the former director of the Mississippi Community Education Center, who has since pleaded guilty to crimes related to the scandal, to pay for Brett DiBiase’s rehab services in California. That payment was among the specific instances of misuse of TANF funds cited when prosecutors announced the initial arrests in 2020.
Prosecutors alleged that Brett DiBiase received TANF funds “for teaching classes about drug abuse,” even though DiBiase was “in a luxury rehabilitation for his own drug use in California at the time and did not perform the services.”
Rarely in the text messages that prosecutors presented in court did the fantasies of divinely ordained victories include the uplift of the needy families MDHS ostensibly exists to support. When they did, it was often as a footnote in a greater story of personal glory.
“We are going to build generational security for our families and we are going to help many many many along the way,” Davis wrote to Ted DiBiase Jr. in August 2018. “I actually have tears in my eyes because I believe with everything I got.”
The TANF funds John Davis was steward over rarely reached those “many, many, many.” Under him, MDHS turned down over 90% of TANF applicants, a practice that continued as recently as 2024, the most recent year for which data is publicly available.
Court adjourned without prosecutors finishing their questioning of Davis or Ted DiBiase Jr.’s defense attorney cross-examining him. The former welfare chief is set to take the stand again on Monday when the trial resumes.
Disclosure: Nick Judin attended New Summit School and in 2006 served as a production assistant on a project filmed at the school in partnership with MCEC.