State Auditor Shad White has taken the unusual tack for a leader of an investigative and enforcement agency of writing a book about an ongoing case — the Mississippi welfare fraud scandal.
“Mississippi Swindle: Brett Favre and the Welfare Scandal that Shocked America” hit bookshelves on Aug. 6 even as feds continue to probe and prosecute and the state tries to recoup tens of millions of federal dollars meant for the poor.
White is already drawing some fire for his tell-all from fellow officials he cast in less-than-flattering light. They question whether it’s appropriate for him to write about and profit from a case he investigated, and whether it could hinder ongoing criminal and civil investigation and prosecution.
Much of White’s new tome appears to be his defense of questions he has faced about his own role in the initial probe, his close relationship with a key figure and early decisions he made.
He also heaps criticism on Republican Attorney General Lynn Fitch and state GOP Chairman Mike Hurst, who was a Trump-appointed U.S. attorney during the time on which the book focuses. White paints Hurst as too political and egotistical, Fitch as inept and uninterested in going after the misspending.
Hurst and Fitch accuse White of writing a self-aggrandizing work of fiction rather than a documentation of the welfare fraud case.
Hurst in a statement said: “It’s sad and disappointing that our state auditor would stoop to these levels of lies, rumors and innuendo in order to bolster himself politically and enrich himself financially during an ongoing criminal investigation. While fantasy and fiction may sell books, and maybe in his mind bolster his chances for higher office, it is not in the best interest of, or the right way forward for, our state.”
Hurst has also questioned whether White not involving the feds — with their wiretapping, surveillance, statutory and other capabilities — in the case until after the initial state arrests were made public hindered wrapping up all the bad actors in the fraud scheme.
A Fitch spokeswoman said of the book: “There is no question that publishing a book while a case is still active makes a complicated case that much more complicated. It remains to be seen what impact the Auditor’s recollection of events will have on the serious work that is being done on behalf of Mississippians.
“We can’t speak for others, but as far as its account of the Attorney General’s role, we consider the book fiction.”
White, an ambitious politician with eyes on the governor’s office, in his book praises himself and his staff for uncovering massive fraud after a tip from White’s majordomo, then-Gov. Phil Bryant. White in the book also praises Hinds County District Attorney Jody Owens, to whom White took the case for prosecution.
White initially eschewed federal prosecutors and the FBI, who had much more investigative and prosecutorial might and experience in tracking down misspending of federal money. In the book he explains that he worried the feds would not move quickly enough to staunch the misspending of millions of federal dollars by state actors. So he took the case to the newly elected Democratic Hinds DA Owens, with whom White says he already had a relationship from the two going through conversion to Catholicism together.
Criminal and civil defendants in the case, and the public, have for years questioned then-Gov. Bryant’s role in the frittering of potentially $100 million meant for the poorest of the poor in the poorest state. Mississippi Today’s Pulitzer Prize-winning “The Backchannel” series by reporter Anna Wolfe showed Bryant using private texts to influence his welfare director and try to broker a deal with a pharmaceutical startup that enticed him with an offer of stock in the company.
White served as policy director when Bryant was lieutenant governor and was his gubernatorial campaign manager in 2015. Bryant in 2018 appointed White as state auditor, a job that has been a launching pad for runs to higher office, and supported White in his subsequent election.
Former state auditors have said that, had they had similar connections to the governor overseeing the agency that spends welfare money, they would have recused themselves or limited their involvement in the auditor’s investigation.
White throughout the book rails against any questions of whether he feathered or sandbagged any investigation for his former boss, who has not been charged with any crime or been included in the state’s civil prosecution.
“Show some proof of this crazy conspiracy,” White writes. “If the feds can find proof on more people, then good. Everyone who did something wrong should go down. If the feds suspect Bryant of telling (a key defendant) to get rich off this money, or if they think Bryant benefitted, then tell them to do the work we’ve been doing. Investigate! Reach their own conclusions! Tell them to do their jobs!”
White, who is critical of Mississippi Today, Wolfe and “The Backchannel” — and never mentions the Pulitzer Prize — shrugs off texts involving Bryant, including one between Bryant and the head of a pharmaceutical company that received welfare money. The drug CEO recently pleaded guilty to federal wire fraud charges in the welfare case, after White’s book had already been written.
The pharmaceutical CEO texted Bryant two days after the governor left office: “Now that you’re unemployed, I’d like to give you a company package for all your help.”
Bryant responded: “Sounds good. Where would be the best place to meet. I am now going to get on it hard.”
White in his book explains: “Bryant sent these controversial texts after my office took our findings to Jody Owens, so they were not central to the opening salvo of the case. They hadn’t even been sent when we went to Jody. But the message would go on to be a focal point for every prosecutor who looked at the matter from then on. How federal and state prosecutors interpreted his messages — had Bryant agreed to accept something of value in exchange for an official act? — would determine Bryant’s future.”
White further defends Bryant, “the most salient fact … was that Bryant had never actually accepted anything of value” and says Bryant hired a new welfare agency head to get to the bottom of misspending.
Book details
Some of White’s knocks on others, particularly Hurst, appear thinly sourced, such as, “I was still hearing rumors that Mike Hurst was telling people I’d handed the DHS case to state prosecutors instead of the feds to protect Governor Bryant.” And, “The rumors were that Mike had been directing FBI agents as if they worked for him, creating animosity with FBI bosses.”
As for Fitch, White says she appeared disinterested in prosecuting the largest fraud case in state history, forcing those who misspent it to pay it back or seizing millions of dollars in property bought with ill begotten money. He questioned her relationship with famed former NFL quarterback Brett Favre, whom the state has sued to recoup welfare money paid to him.
White writes that Fitch failed to help freeze a bank account holding welfare money but, “Instead Fitch filmed a video around that time with Brett Favre (where he called her ‘Lynn Finch with an n in her last name) discussing COVID and promoting her office — all after the public knew Favre was enmeshed in the scandal … perhaps Fitch was wagering it was better for her long-term political future to align with Favre.”
Favre is suing White claiming defamation, and Fitch has refused to have the AG’s office represent White in the case in part because his book criticizes her office creating a conflict of interest. Fitch’s office has also warned White that any legal matters involving his book would be outside the scope of his job and he would be on his own legally.
In the book White writes: “Attorney General Lynn Fitch has been quiet throughout the DHS debacle, failing to even register a meaningful comment on the largest public fraud scheme in the state’s history. Whereas Jody (Owens) and I faced criticism for moving too slowly — despite being the ones to uncover and serve the first indictments in the scheme — Fitch had escaped controversy by doing nothing at all.”
White’s book has been the talk of Mississippi’s political class for months, with many questioning whether it’s proper for him to profit from a case in which he was involved as state auditor. A recent promotional video of White put out by the publisher appeared to be shot from a state office, with White sitting beneath a large state of Mississippi seal, further prompting the questions.
Tom Hood, director of the Mississippi Ethics Commission, said that generally, an elected official can write such a book.
“The Ethics Commission has advised in numerous opinions that public servants are not prohibited from taking general knowledge or experience gained through the course of their government service and using it in the private sector.”
But professor John Pelissero, director of Government Ethics at the Markkula Center for Applied Ethics at Santa Clara University, said, “I can understand why people would question his motivations here.”
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