The bad blood between two of Mississippi’s higher profile statewide officials — State Auditor Shad White and Attorney General Lynn Fitch — is getting worse.
Last week, Fitch filed a lawsuit to try to stop White from pursuing his recovery efforts against former NFL quarterback Brett Favre. This is not because Fitch disagrees over whether Favre still owes the state money from the massive welfare scandal but because White, she claims, is stepping on her turf.
Normally, it is the auditor’s job to identify misspending but the attorney general’s job to chase after it if the alleged beneficiary of the misspending refuses to cough the money up.
In this case, White claimed he was taking matters into his own hands because Fitch’s office has a pattern in this case and in others of not vigorously pursuing the Audit Department’s findings. White is not the only one to complain about Fitch’s performance either. At least two other statewide officials, Lt. Gov. Delbert Hosemann and Secretary of State Michael Watson, have said something similar about Fitch’s past disinterest in pursuing alleged campaign finance violations.
If Fitch thinks those criticisms are unfair, she’s got the next four years to prove it, as she has now begun her second term as attorney general.
The conflict between Fitch and White, though, is about more than turf wars. Speculation is that both have their eye on running for governor in 2027, since the incumbent, Tate Reeves, will have to vacate the office in early 2028 due to term limits. Thus, they have an incentive not to cooperate with each other and to try to make the other look bad.
White is reportedly going to do just that in a book, to be released later this year, about the sprawling welfare scandal that the state auditor initially uncovered. Fitch’s office received an advance copy of the book and claims it contains disparaging and inaccurate observations about her office and its conduct during the investigation into how welfare money was improperly or illegally spent, including on two projects being pushed by Favre. As a result, Fitch has withdrawn her office from representing White in a defamation suit filed by Favre.
Fitch’s actions are contradictory. She doesn’t want to represent White in one part of his dispute with Favre, but she insists on doing so in another.
The situation, though, could play out well for White. Fitch’s heart might not have been in it to help the state auditor beat the defamation lawsuit. And if she doesn’t now collect the more than $700,000 that White says Favre still owes, the state auditor could use that against her should they be opponents in a 2027 governor’s race. He would be able to claim that he could have gotten the money but she stopped him.
Rather than engage in a court battle over their respective powers, White might do better politically to concede the point to Fitch and say, “Go to it.” Then the pressure would be on her to produce.
