Brett Favre Repays $600K in Mississippi Welfare Money

With regard to repaying $600,000 in misallocated Mississippi welfare money that he was paid for speaking appearances he never even made, former NFL quarterback Brett Favre didn’t exactly run a two-minute drill.

After a 2020 audit found the 52-year-old received state cash for multiple speaking engagements he didn’t attend, the former Falcons, Packers, Jets and Vikings quarterback said he didn’t know the money came from a welfare fund and vowed to repay it in a Facebook post.

“I have never received monies for obligations I didn’t meet,” Favre wrote at the time. “I was unaware that the money being dispersed was paid for out of funds not intended for that purpose, and because of that I am refunding the full amount back to the state of Mississippi … I love Mississippi and I would never knowingly do anything to take away from those that need it most.”

But, as of May of this year, Favre still hadn’t paid Mississippi back the full $1.1 million he inappropriately received after making an initial payment of $500,000 to the state in May of last year.

Apparently, that has changed as Mississippi auditor Shad White said Wednesday that Favre had paid the $600,000 he owed to the auditor’s office this week after the quarterback was sent a letter on October 12 demanding payment, according to ESPN.

“The sum demanded represents illegal expenditures of public funds made to you or to entities or combines for which you are legally obligated to pay and/or the unlawful dispositions of public property, including public funds, made with you or with entities or combines for which you are legally responsible to pay,” per the letter. “These illegal expenditures and unlawful dispositions were made when you knew or had reason to know through the exercise of reasonable diligence that the expenditures were illegal and/or the dispositions were unlawful.”

But Favre is still not out of the red as the letter the state sent him asked for $828,000, which was the $600K plus $228,000 in interest. “If he does not pay that within 30 days of our demand, the AG will be responsible for enforcing the payment of the interest in court,” White said. (Favre is not facing criminal charges, but other people have been charged in connection to the embezzlement case.)

Favre, who is pro-CBD (and talked to InsideHook about it) but may or may have gotten vaccinated against COVID-19 despite his age, earned nearly $138 million in salary alone during his 28 NFL seasons, so coming up with a little more than $200K shouldn’t be too difficult for him. But, based on how long it took Favre to pay back the money he didn’t deserve and shouldn’t have received, it wouldn’t be a surprise to see him drag his cleats in making good on the interest he owes.