Court rules in favor of OpenAI and Sam Altman in lawsuit brought by Elon Musk

Added: 2026-05-18

[00:00:00]Breaking news. The jury finding Mus did not bring his lawsuit until after the three-year statute of limitations had passed. That means all claims against Open AI CEO Sam Alman are now dismissed.

[00:00:12]Joining me now, Trevor Alt and legal contributor James Sample. Trevor, you've been following this. Uh, so break down the ruling.

[00:00:19]>> Yeah, Kira. So, this was a very swift ending to what was weeks of testimony and one of the most substantial lawsuits with substantial damage totals that we have seen in recent memory. Elon Musk was asking for $150 billion in damages and for OpenAI to return to its previous nonprofit model. And it took little more than an hour for the jury to very quickly rule in favor of Open AI. Elon Musk losing on all claims here specifically because they say he simply didn't file this lawsuit quick enough.

[00:00:49]And so all the these people really the world were waiting on how this jury was going to decide in favor of or against Elon Musk whether or not those claims were true that he was involved in the founding of OpenAI going back more than a decade ago 2015 left the company in 2018 and he essentially alleged that OpenAI was stealing a charity by pivoting from being a nonprofit organization to becoming a for-profit organization and partnering up with Microsoft. We have no idea whether or not the jury believes those claims had any merit at all. Essentially, they said Elon Musk was aware of what he was claiming going back to 2021, which means that three-year statute of limitations has already passed. And whether or not he is correct, he has no legal standing for this lawsuit.

[00:01:34]>> And James, that's we wanted to follow up with. If the statute of limitations pass, then why did this case even make it to the jury?

[00:01:43]>> That's a great question, Cara. And as we discussed uh together last week, this was the threshold question. This is the there were sort we discussed the idea that there were three questions that would go before the jury. But if the jury answered question number one that the statute of limitations has had expired, uh then that would preclude even considering questions two and three. And that's exactly what happened to the the specific answer to your question is partly a whether or not a statute of limitations has run is not just strictly a question of a calendar.

[00:02:15]It's about when Elon Musk should have had knowledge. That's when his claim if he had a claim would begin to acrue when he had knowledge of what of the breach of contract claim that he asserted here.

[00:02:27]So the first point in which he would have had the knowledge that he had a plausible claim, not necessarily a meritorious claim was deemed to be prior to the expiration of the statute of limitations, but more than 3 years ago.

[00:02:41]So because of that, as Trevor said, not just weeks of the trial, but years of preparing to bring this case uh go down the drain.

[00:02:50]>> So Trevor, is this effectively then over for Elon's fight against open AI? I would say in terms of Elon Musk trying to prevent OpenAI from uh aggressively pivoting toward this for-profit model, yes, it's basically done with going forward. What you had here essentially, Kira was one of the most powerful men in the world suing another one. And Elon Musk not only wanted $150 billion in damages. He wanted OpenAI to revert back to its nonprofit model and he wanted Sam Alman to be removed from the board essentially from OpenAI. What this means, it is a unanimous victory for both OpenAI and for Sam Alman. And it means that they likely will get to move forward not just in their business with the their substantial partnerships where you're talking about hundreds of billions of dollars that they've had coming into the company, but they are also talking about publicly opening, maybe being publicly traded uh in the near future here. And with this ruling, it would appear to be all systems go for a company that is very quickly become one of the cornerstones cornerstone companies really one of the most powerful companies in the entire world.

[00:03:54]>> So what do you think uh James what kind of precedent you know could this set if if any?

[00:04:00]>> I think it would have set more of a precedent if they'd reached the merits and had ruled one way or the other on the merits. Kira, I mean the statute of limitations inquiry is relatively straightforward. It's basically a combination of the calendar and the facts. But this is a huge, huge win for Open AI, a huge win for Sam Alman, a massive defeat for Elon Musk. And it does leave out there the open questions of whether or not the claims that Musk was trying to assert would have had merit if the jury had reached those. But in terms of the precedent that this sets, really what it sets is that Sam Alman and Open AAI can move forward without the threat of this litigation hanging over them. I'm sure Mr. Musk will appeal, but that is a high high hurdle to clear after a jury verdict of this nature.