On the stand, Elon Musk can’t escape his own tweets

Elon Musk appeared in a California federal court on Wednesday to argue that Sam Altman and OpenAI's co-founders "stole a charity," but his testimony took an unexpected turn when he admitted, under oath, that Tesla is not currently pursuing artificial general intelligence (AGI)—directly contradicting a tweet he had posted just weeks earlier claiming "Tesla will be one of the companies to make AGI." The lawsuit alleges Altman tricked Musk into backing OpenAI as a non-profit, only to later launch its for-profit arm and let it dominate the organization. During cross-examination by OpenAI's lawyer William Savitt, Musk acknowledged he had discussed converting OpenAI to a for-profit as early as 2016, and in 2017 explored creating a for-profit arm where he would hold majority equity and control. When those plans fell apart, he stopped regular donations but continued paying for office space until 2020.

Savitt also pressed Musk on Tesla's AI ambitions, forcing him to clarify that Tesla's work focuses only on self-driving, not AGI. Musk was confronted with his own X post claiming he invested $100 million in OpenAI, when only $38 million actually changed hands—he argued his reputation and network made up for the difference. The cross-examination revealed Musk had backed efforts by Tesla and Neuralink to poach OpenAI employees while still on its board, including recruiting Andrej Karpathy to lead self-driving at Tesla. The case may ultimately hinge on whether jurors and Judge Yvonne Gonzalez Rogers distinguish between investors in OpenAI having capped or unlimited profit potential, with Microsoft's early investments having restrictions that were later rolled back.