Nevada Chief U.S. District Judge Andrew Gordon dismissed FBI Director Kash Patel's $10 million defamation lawsuit against online commentator Jim Stewartson, finding the court lacked personal jurisdiction over him.
Patel sued in 2023 over Stewartson's online posts calling him a “blatantly incompetent chud,” a “googly-eyed Kremlin” asset, and a person who plotted to “overthrow the government” on January 6. Stewartson initially did not respond, and Patel won a $250,000 default judgment in August 2025. Stewartson then challenged that judgment, arguing he had no meaningful ties to Nevada, and the court agreed, vacating the judgment and dismissing the case.
The significance is not the insult but the plaintiff. A sitting FBI director, who runs the nation's premier law-enforcement agency and has publicly threatened to investigate journalists and critics, using a personal $10 million defamation suit to punish a blogger for name-calling is a use of legal process against protected speech. Courts have repeatedly treated exactly this kind of hyperbolic online invective as opinion the First Amendment protects. After the ruling, Stewartson declared that people are now “free to refer to” the FBI director “as a 'chud,' a 'googly-eyed Kremlin bitch,' and a 'traitor' without fear of legal repercussions.”