Pat McAfee apologized to Ole Miss student Mary Kate Cornett on “The Pat McAfee Show” Wednesday, months after amplifying an unsubstantiated rumor involving Cornett, the fallout from which forced her to switch to online classes and move out of her dormitory.
The rumor, which involved a false claim involving Cornett’s romantic life, started on the anonymous messaging app YikYak in February before making its way to X and later the sports talk world, including posts by Barstool personalities KFC Barstool and Jack Mac, a discussion by ESPN radio hosts in St. Louis and a mention on McAfee’s show.
“I have since learned that the story was not true and that my show played a role in the anguish caused to a great family and especially to a young woman, Mary Kate Cornett,” McAfee said on his show on Wednesday.
In an interview with The Athletic in April, Cornett, who was 18 at the time, said that after the rumor took off, she had vile messages slipped under her dorm room door. Campus police told her she was a target, and she switched to online classes and moved to emergency housing.
“The matter was settled to each party’s satisfaction,” Justin Cornett, Mary Kate’s father, told The Athletic.
Once Cornett’s phone number was posted online, she told The Athletic that she received degrading voicemails and that someone created a cryptocurrency memecoin with her name attached to it. Police showed up at Cornett’s mother’s house, her boyfriend faced online bullying and her grandfather received a taunting call in the middle of the night.
“I would like people to be held accountable for what they’ve done,” Cornett said in April. “You’re ruining my life by talking about it on your show for nothing but attention, but here I am staying up until 5 in the morning, every night, throwing up, not eating because I’m so anxious about what’s going to happen for the rest of my life.”
In April, weeks after first discussing the rumor, McAfee alluded to the situation during a live event in Pittsburgh, saying that he “didn’t want to add any more negativity as it was taking place” and would try to “make some sort of silver lining in a very terrible situation.” KFC Barstool, Jack Mac and Barstool Sports founder Dave Portnoy also apologized for the situation.
McAfee refrained from naming Cornett specifically at the time. He said on Wednesday that he waited to discuss the situation in detail until he could talk with Cornett and her family directly.
“I recently got to meet Mary Kate and her family, and I got a chance to sincerely apologize to them and acknowledge that what I said about Mary Kate was based solely on what others were saying on the Internet or had been previously reported by others, and that we had no personal knowledge about Mary Kate or her personal life.”
McAfee’s show and its guests have a reputation for pushing the boundaries and are proud provocateurs. Despite that, McAfee has apologized for language in the past, such as when he described WNBA player Caitlin Clark as a “white bitch.” The opening to his show includes the disclaimer that “it is meant to be comedic informative” and that “the opinions expressed on this show do not necessarily reflect the beliefs of their peers, their boss, or ESPN.”
“I deeply regret the pain that was caused,” McAfee said about Cornett on Wednesday. “I hated watching what our show was a part of in our interviews and reading about it. And my hope is that this can be something that we all learn from going forward. I know we certainly have.”
(Photo: Kirby Lee / Imagn Images)