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Hall of Fame quarterback Brett Favre said he was recently diagnosed with Parkinson’s Disease while testifying at congressional hearing on federal welfare reform on Tuesday.
The 54-year-old veteran of 20 NFL seasons made the admission before the House Ways and Means Committee in a hearing about Temporary Assistance for Needy Families (TANF) funds – “$8 million of which went to Favre himself, a volleyball stadium at his alma mater, and to a drug company he backed,” Front Office Sports reports.
Brett Favre revealed his Parkinson’s diagnosis during a discussion about Prevacus, the drug company whose founder and Favre business partner, Jake VanLandingham, recently pleaded guilty to illegally receiving more than $2 million of federal funds as part of the ongoing Mississippi welfare scandal.
“Sadly, I also lost an investment in a company that I believed was developing a breakthrough concussion drug I thought would help others,” Favre told Congress. “I’m sure you’ll understand, while it’s too late for me because I’ve recently been diagnosed with Parkinson’s, this is also a cause dear to my heart.”
$5 million of those TANF funds were spent on the construction of a volleyball center at the University of Southern Mississippi, the college where Brett Favre’s daughter had committed to play.
In a October 2023 deposition, former University of Southern Mississippi President Rodney Bennett claimed Brett Favre agreed to pay for the “entire” volleyball arena.
“I wanted to help my alma mater and benefit the community,” Favre told Congress. “Southern Miss introduced me to the nonprofit to see if they could help with funding. I had no way of knowing that there was anything wrong with how the state funded the project especially since it was publicly approved by many state agencies and multiple attorneys including the Attorney General.”
In August of 2023, attorney’s for the Mississippi Department of Human Services filed a 14-page document claiming Brett Favre “failed to answer any of this discovery’ related to his text messages with others involved with the alleged scheme where around $8 million federal welfare funds were funneled to Favre and projects close to the Hall of Fame quarterback.”
Favre, one of 43 defendants in a lawsuit filed by the Mississippi Department of Human Services trying to recover more than $90 million in illegally misspent TANF funds, also claimed in front of Congress on Tuesday that he was there “to share what I’ve now seen up close, about how reforms are needed to stop the misspending of TANF funds.”