A federal decide in Texas on Tuesday dismissed a 2025 defamation lawsuit introduced by FBI Director Kash Patel towards a former FBI official who claimed Patel had “been seen at nightclubs excess of he has been on the seventh ground of the Hoover constructing.”
U.S. District Decide George Hanks Jr. dismissed the lawsuit towards Frank Figliuzzi, the previous FBI assistant director for counterintelligence, writing in his choice: “An individual of cheap intelligence and studying wouldn’t have taken his assertion actually.”
Figliuzzi, who had been working as an analyst for MSNBC (now MS NOW), made the feedback on the community’s “Morning Joe” program final 12 months.
“By saying that Patel spent ‘much more’ time at nightclubs than his workplace, Figliuzzi delivered his reply ‘in an exaggerated, provocative and amusing manner,’ using rhetorical hyperbole.” Hanks wrote.
“The Court docket finds that Figliuzzi’s assertion is rhetorical hyperbole that can’t represent defamation. Accordingly, Dir. Patel has didn’t state a declare towards Figliuzzi, and his lawsuit have to be dismissed,” the choice continued.
Nevertheless, Hanks dominated that Figliuzzi wouldn’t be capable of get well attorneys’ charges and prices beneath Texas’s anti-SLAPP regulation.
The lawsuit is just not associated to the swimsuit Patel filed on Monday towards The Atlantic.
