Kash Patel’s Implausible Lawsuit Against The Atlantic

On Friday, April 17th, The Atlantic published a two-thousand-word story about the F.B.I. director Kash Patel’s alleged excessive drinking. Titled “The FBI Director Is MIA,” the piece recounted multiple sources’ serious concerns about the drinking—how it was affecting Patel’s ability to deal with F.B.I. matters and, potentially, putting national security at risk. The reporter, Sarah Fitzpatrick, said that she had spoken to dozens of sources, including current and former F.B.I. officials, Department of Justice officials, lawyers, lobbyists, and hospitality workers, who painted a picture of a director who frequently gets visibly drunk at night clubs, including one in Las Vegas called the Poodle Room. Patel’s drinking allegedly resulted in him often being unavailable to fulfill his duties or asleep at critical times. In a particularly striking anecdote, according to multiple sources, a request for “breaching equipment” was made to smash down a locked door to a room when agents were unable to get a response from Patel, who was inside. (It’s unclear whether the door was actually broken down.) Fitzpatrick later described sources who were so concerned about the national-security risk of a regularly incapacitated director that they felt alarm “bordering on panic.”The piece includes statements of support for Patel