The signalgate lawsuit is fundamentally different. In that case, a government watchdog group is suing members of the government (Hegseth, Gabbard, a few others) and whatever the records-keeping agency is named, alleging they failed to adhere to records-keeping regulations.
It had nothing to do with defamation, false reporting, or anything like that. Patel’s lawsuit is similar to the ones filed by Trump against media outlets for “fake news”, a few of which he’s won.
It’s also similar to the Covington Catholic lawsuit, where CNN was continuing to inform it’s readers that the boys were mocking and harassing the poor Native American man who, it turns out, was obviously trying to provoke a reaction from the group of schoolchildren. The kids were just standing there waiting for the bus, then they became national news, received death threats, were doxxed, and harassed for months because CNN made its gullible audience believe that the boy in the MAGA hat was mocking and harassing the grown man who waltzed up to them and began banging a drum in their faces with no explanation.
I actually watched the whole video and started a thread on that one.