Elon Musk returned to the witness stand in Oakland, California on Wednesday for a second day of testimony in his landmark lawsuit against OpenAI, accusing the artificial intelligence company he co-founded of betraying its original nonprofit mission and enriching its leadership at the expense of its founding principles.
Musk co-founded OpenAI alongside Sam Altman and Greg Brockman in 2015 as a nonprofit committed to developing AI for the broad benefit of humanity. The case before a federal court jury in the United States District Court for the Northern District of California centres on whether OpenAI’s subsequent shift toward a for-profit structure constituted a breach of that charitable mission.
On Tuesday, Musk told the jury: “If we make it okay to loot a charity, the entire foundation of charitable giving in America will be destroyed.” He said he had contributed what he described as at least $44 million to OpenAI in its early years based on the understanding it would remain nonprofit, and that he would never have done so had a profit motive been involved.
On Wednesday, under questioning from his own legal team, Musk elaborated on his objections, saying OpenAI could not simultaneously benefit from the reputational advantages of being a nonprofit and then switch to a profit-driven model. “You can’t have your cake and eat it too,” he said. He described moving through three phases in his relationship with the company — initial enthusiasm, growing doubt, and ultimately a conviction that the organisation was “looting the non-profit.”
Musk is seeking approximately $130 billion in damages and the removal of Altman and Brockman from their leadership roles, as well as a return of the company to nonprofit control. He also alleges that Microsoft, which has invested heavily in OpenAI, aided and abetted what he describes as a breach of charitable trust.
OpenAI’s lead attorney William Savitt told the jury the case amounts to “sour grapes” from a founder who left the company in 2018 after a dispute over control and is now seeking to hobble a successful competitor to his own AI venture, xAI. Savitt argued that Musk himself had been involved in discussions about shifting to a for-profit structure and only turned against it when he was unable to assume full control.
Musk also faced scrutiny from the judge for posts on his social media platform X referring to Altman as “Scam Altman,” prompting a judicial warning against conduct that could influence proceedings.
Other witnesses expected to testify during the trial include Altman, Brockman, and Microsoft Chief Executive Officer Satya Nadella. OpenAI, now structured as a public benefit corporation under a nonprofit foundation, maintains that its restructuring was necessary to raise funds, recruit talent, and sustain its research capacity, and that it has never abandoned its core mission.
