In a legal battle between two former National Football League players, both Hall of Famers, sports talk-show host Shannon Sharpe has prevailed over quarterback legend Brett Favre.
The dispute arose after a controversy in Mississippi over whether Favre used federal funds intended to help people in poverty for a different purpose — to help fund a new volleyball facility at the University of Southern Mississippi, Favre’s alma mater and also where his daughter plays on the volleyball team.
At the time, Sharpe co-hosted a popular sports news program with Skip Bayless called “Skip and Shannon: Undisputed.” On the Sept. 14, 2023, show, Sharpe and Bayless had a pointed conversation about how this controversy might tarnish Favre’s legacy.
Favre specifically objected to the following three comments from Sharpe:
1. “The problem that I have with this situation, you’ve got to be a sorry mofo to steal from the lowest of the low.”
2. “Brett Favre is taking from the underserved” in Mississippi.
3. Favre “stole money from people that really needed that money.”
Favre sent Sharpe a letter, asking him to retract these statements. When Sharpe refused, Favre sued him for defamation in state court. Sharpe removed the lawsuit to a federal district court. The district court dismissed Favre’s suit, finding that Sharpe’s comments were protected rhetorical hyperbole rather than actual statements of fact.
On appeal, the 5th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals affirmed the lower court but for a different reason. The 5th Circuit held that Sharpe’s statements – however intemperate or harsh – were protected opinion rather than statements of fact. After all, the court said, Sharpe and Bayless were offering their opinions on a scandal that was reported in a Mississippi Today article and elsewhere.
“Sharpe’s statements could not have been reasonably understood as declaring or implying a provable assertion of fact,” the 5th Circuit wrote in its Sept. 16, 2024, opinion in Favre v. Sharpe.
“His statements are better viewed as strongly stated opinions about the widely reported welfare scandal,” the appeals court said.
David L. Hudson Jr. teaches First Amendment law and constitutional law classes at Belmont University College of Law. He is the author, co-author, or co-editor of more than 50 books, including The Constitution Explained: A Guide for Every American (Visible Ink Press, 2022) and The First Amendment: Freedom of Speech (Thomson Reuters, 2012).
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