Felicity Huffman is finally speaking out about the Varsity Blues admissions scandal after being jailed for 11 days for bribing her daughter’s way into college: ‘I had to break the law to give her a future’

Felicity Huffman has finally broken her silence on the Varsity Blues scandal, which saw her spend 11 days in jail after bribing college officials for $15,000 to mess up her daughter’s SAT scores. She said she felt like she had “no choice” but to break the law.

Huffman paid $30,000 in fines and spent 11 days in jail after being charged with fraud in 2019.

She had paid Rick Singer $15,000 to fudge her daughter Sophia’s SAT scores to get her a spot in college, and was among a group of wealthy, famous parents caught up in the scandal.

Actress Lori Loughlin was also jailed for paying for both of her daughters’ admission to USC.

In her first public comments outside the courtroom, the 60-year-old Huffman says ABC that she thought it was “a joke” when FBI agents entered her home to arrest her.

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“They came into my house, woke my daughters up at gunpoint – again, nothing new for the black and brown community – and put my hands behind my back and handcuffed me.

‘I asked if I could get dressed. I thought it was a hoax. I literally turned to one of the FBI people in a body armor and a gun and I said, “is this a joke?”

Huffman said she regretted the plan but felt she had no choice at the time because Sophia, who she previously said has a learning disability, would not have been accepted otherwise.

Sophia now studies drama at Carnegie Mellon.

‘I felt like I had to give my daughter a chance at a future. And so it was kind of like my daughter’s future, which meant breaking the law,” she said.

“I think the people I owe a debt and an apology to are the academic community and the students and the families who sacrifice and work very hard to get to where they are legitimately going.”

Huffman is now speaking out to raise awareness of A New Way of Life, an organization that helps formerly incarcerated women reintegrate into society.

“I want to use my experience, what I’ve been through and the pain to bring something good,” she said.

Huffman and husband William H. Macy hired Singer to help Sophia improve her scores so she could attend college.

She claims that the plan was not obvious at first, but became clear when Singer told them that Sophia would not be accepted into any school without greasing the wheels.

‘After a year he started saying that your daughter is not going to any of the universities she wants to go to.

‘And I believed him. And so when he slowly started presenting the criminal plan, it seemed like – and I know this seemed crazy at the time – but that was my only option to give my daughter a future.

“And I know hindsight is 20/20, but I felt like I would be a bad mother if I didn’t.

“So – I did it,” she said.

Sophia was unaware that her parents had paid for someone to change her test answers after she completed the SATS.

The scheme involved Singer paying a handful of discreet SAT test proctors who would inflate students’ scores once they completed the exam.

On the day of the SAT test, she said Sophia was nervous and asked if they could go out for ice cream afterwards.

“She said, ‘Can we get ice cream afterward?’” Huffman recalls. “I’m scared about the test.

‘What can we do that’s fun? And I kept thinking, turn around, just turn around.

“And to my eternal shame, I didn’t,” Huffman said.

Loughlin and husband Mossimo Giuliani had their daughters disguised as sports stars and propped them up on rowing machines to cover up applications that presented them as athletes.

Rick Singer, the mastermind, was sentenced to three and a half years in prison in January this year.