Veteran journalist and public affairs specialist Clint Brewer said he would not have approved publication of The Atlantic’s reporting on Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) Director Kash Patel that led to the director filing a $250 million defamation lawsuit against the publication.
Patel’s lawsuit, filed Monday in federal court in Washington, D.C., alleges that the magazine published false claims about his conduct, including accusations of excessive drinking and erratic behavior, based upon accounts of two dozen anonymous sources.
Drawing on decades of editorial experience, Brewer emphasized during Tuesday’s edition of The Michael Patrick Leahy Show that while anonymous sourcing remains a legitimate journalistic tool, its use must be carefully weighed against evidence and sourcing credibility.
“I think it’s dictated by the situation,” Brewer said. “There are certain stories that journalists really can’t get to without the use of anonymous sources.”
However, Brewer made clear that anonymous sourcing alone is not inherently sufficient to support serious allegations, especially those targeting a public official.
“If you’re going to write a story about somebody’s personal behavior while serving in an official capacity, I always felt like you had to have more than just people talking about it,” he said. “Is there an email, is there a text thread? … it’s always preferable if you can bookend those anecdotes and interviews with actual documentation.”
Brewer described what he sees as a broader erosion of traditional newsroom standards, noting that the media landscape has become increasingly decentralized.
“Standards and practices have become very decentralized,” he said. “There used to be a common code in most legacy newsrooms… I think a lot of that’s out the window.”
Still, he stressed that core editorial responsibilities remain essential, especially vetting claims and evaluating sources’ motivations.
“You have to consider the motivation of the source,” Brewer explained. “Is it somebody who doesn’t like the person you’re reporting on? Is it somebody that professionally benefits from that person maybe being taken down a notch? You have to view the anonymous source through the prism of what’s in it for them.”
He added that stories relying heavily on unnamed sources require heightened scrutiny, particularly when those sources may have personal or professional grievances.
Brewer also criticized the reported timeline given to Patel to respond to the allegations prior to publication, which was less than two hours.
“When you’re asking somebody to respond to months of reporting… with a two hour window for reply,” he said, “that’s… one of the things I found the most objectionable.”
He contrasted that with traditional editorial expectations.
“I think you’ve got to give the target of the story ample time to respond… days, weeks,” Brewer said, adding bluntly, “No,” when asked if roughly two hours would be sufficient.
Beyond editorial concerns, Brewer pointed to evolving legal standards that could shape the outcome of Patel’s lawsuit, including the concept of “false light” defamation.
“It’s not that you got individual facts wrong, but that your selective presentation of facts casts the target of your story in a false light,” he said. “And I think that’s what we’re dealing with here.”
When pressed directly on whether he would have approved the story for publication, Brewer said he wouldn’t, based on the information publicly known.
He likened the situation to a well-known scene from the film All the President’s Men, in which editors demand stronger reporting before publishing.
“You just have to do that sometimes,” Brewer said. “You don’t have it. Go get more.”
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https://t.co/P3cNebb6hy— Michael Patrick Leahy (@michaelpleahy) April 21, 2026
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Kaitlin Housler is a reporter at The Tennessee Star and The Star News Network. Follow Kaitlin on X / Twitter.
