Elon Musk and OpenAI CEO Sam Altman head to court in high-stakes
showdown over AI
[April 27, 2026] By
BARBARA ORTUTAY and MICHAEL LIEDTKE
OAKLAND, Calif. (AP) — Technology tycoons Elon Musk and Sam Altman are
poised to face off in a high-stakes trial revolving around the alleged
betrayal, deceit and unbridled ambition that blurred the bickering
billionaires' once-shared vision for the development of artificial
intelligence.
The trial, which is scheduled to begin Monday with jury selection,
centers on the 2015 birth of ChatGPT maker OpenAI as a nonprofit startup
primarily funded by Musk before evolving into a capitalistic venture now
valued at $852 billion.
The trial's outcome could sway the balance of power in AI — breakthrough
technology that is increasingly being feared as a potential job killer
and an existential threat to humanity's survival.
Those perceived risks are among the reasons that Musk, the world's
richest person, cites for filing an August 2024 lawsuit that will now be
decided by a jury and U.S. District Judge Yvonne Gonzalez Rogers in
Oakland, California.
The civil lawsuit accuses Altman, OpenAI's CEO, and his top lieutenant,
Greg Brockman, of double-crossing Musk by straying from the San
Francisco company's founding mission to be an altruistic steward of a
revolutionary technology. The lawsuit alleges they shifted into a
moneymaking mode behind his back.
OpenAI has brushed off Musk's allegations as an unfounded case of sour
grapes that's aimed at undercutting its rapid growth and bolstering
Musk's own xAI, which he launched in 2023 as a competitor.
Trial promises clashing testimony from two tech titans
Musk, who invested about $38 million in OpenAI from December 2015
through May 2017, initially was seeking more than $100 billion in
damages.
But any damages now are likely to be much smaller after a series of
pre-trial rulings that went against Musk. Musk has since abandoned a bid
for damages for himself and instead is seeking an unspecified amount of
money to be paid to fund the altruistic efforts of OpenAI's charitable
arm. The money would be paid primarily by OpenAI's for-profit
operations, and Microsoft, which became the company's biggest investor
after Musk cut off his funding.
Musk's lawsuit also seeks Altman's ouster from OpenAI's board. Musk's
decision to stop funding the company contributed to a bitter falling out
between the former allies. Musk says he was responding to deceptive
conduct that OpenAI's board picked up on when it fired Altman as CEO in
2023 before he got his job back days later.
But the trial also carries risks for Musk, who last month was held
liable by another jury for defrauding investors during his $44 billion
takeover of Twitter in 2022. Any damaging details about Musk and his
business tactics could be particularly hurtful now because his rocket
ship maker, SpaceX, plans to go public this summer in an initial public
offering that could make him the world's first trillionaire.
However it turns out, the trial is expected to provide riveting theater,
with contrasting testimony from two of technology's most influential and
polarizing figures in the 54-year-old Musk and the 41-year-old Altman.
“Part of this is about whether a jury believes the people who will
testify and whether they are credible,” Gonzalez Rogers said during a
court hearing earlier this year while explaining why she believe the
case merited a trial. The judge will make the final decision on the
case, with the jury serving in an advisory role.
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Sam Altman arrives at the 12th Breakthrough Prize Ceremony on
Saturday, April 18, 2026, at Barker Hangar in Santa Monica, Calif.
(Photo by Jordan Strauss/Invision/AP)
 Evidence has included glimpses of
the AI race's early days
Musk, whose estimated fortune stands at about $780 billion, has long
been hailed as a visionary for his roles creating digital payment
pioneer PayPal, electric automaker Tesla and rocket ship maker
SpaceX. But he has also provoked backlashes with his social media
commentary, unfulfilled promises about Tesla's self-driving
technology and his cost-cutting role last year in President Donald
Trump's administration.
Some of Musk's erratic behavior has been tied to allegations of
taking hallucinogenic drugs, but Gonzalez Rogers ruled that he can't
be asked during the trial about his suspected use of ketamine. But
the judge is allowing Musk to be questioned about his attendance at
the 2017 Burning Man festival in Nevada, a free-wheeling celebration
known for widespread drug use. The judge is also allowing Musk to be
questioned about his relationship with former OpenAI board member
Shivon Zilis, the mother of several of his children.
Altman, currently sitting on a roughly $3 billion fortune, didn't
emerge in the public consciousness until the late 2022 release of
ChatGPT. The tech boom triggered by that conversational chatbot has
led some to liken Altman to a 21st-century version of the nuclear
bomb inventor, J. Robert Oppenheimer.
Although Altman was initially hailed as trailblazer he is now facing
blowback amid worries about AI's potential dangers. Earlier this
month, the New Yorker magazine published a profile that painted him
as an unscrupulous executive. Days later, a 20-year-old man worried
about AI's effect on humanity was arrested on attempted murder
charges after throwing a Molotov cocktail at Altman's San Francisco
home.
The dueling testimonies of Altman and Musk are expected to open a
window into some of the thinking that helped trigger the AI race, as
well as the unraveling of their friendship. The kinship was forged
in 2015 when they agreed to build AI in a more responsible and safer
way than the profit-driven companies controlled by Google
co-founders Larry Page and Sergey Brin and Facebook founder Mark
Zuckerberg, according to evidence submitted ahead of the trial.
Details of the bitter break between the two men were captured in a
February 2023 email exchange that surfaced as part of the evidence
leading up to the trial.
After letting Musk know “you're my hero,” Altman tells him: “I am
tremendously thankful for everything you’ve done to help —I don't
think OpenAI would have happened without you — and it really
(expletive) hurts when you publicly attack OpenAI.”
Musk's response: “I hear you and it is certainly not my intention to
be hurtful, for which I apologize, but the fate of civilization is
at stake.”
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