Musk v. Altman Trial: Week One Inside the Courtroom
Musk Takes the Stand in Landmark OpenAI Trial
Elon Musk dominated the first week of his high-stakes federal lawsuit against OpenAI CEO Sam Altman, testifying for more than seven hours over three days at the Ronald V. Dellums US Courthouse in Oakland, California. The Musk v. Altman trial, presided over by U.S. District Judge Yvonne Gonzalez Rogers, began on April 28, 2026, with Musk as the first witness called to the stand — and his testimony proved as combative, candid, and consequential as the case itself.
The lawsuit, which Musk filed in 2024, seeks approximately $130 billion in damages from OpenAI and co-defendant Microsoft. It also demands the removal of Sam Altman and Greg Brockman from OpenAI's leadership and a reversion of the company to a nonprofit structure. At the heart of Musk's case is the claim that OpenAI — which he co-founded in 2015 as a nonprofit AI research organization — betrayed the charitable mission on which it was built when it pivoted toward a commercial, for-profit model.
"You just can't steal a charity, and that's what it comes down to," Musk testified, a line that quickly became the defining quote of the trial's opening week.
Three Days on the Stand: What Musk Said
Musk's testimony was wide-ranging, covering his foundational role at OpenAI, his early financial contributions, the recruitment of key personnel, and his concerns about the direction the company has taken under Altman's leadership. Musk invested approximately $38 million in OpenAI from December 2015 through May 2017, and during testimony acknowledged that he never fulfilled his original $1 billion commitment to the company — a fact OpenAI's defense also confirmed at trial.
Musk cast himself as the driving force behind OpenAI's creation. "I came up with the idea, the name, recruited the key people, taught them everything I know, provided all of the initial funding — besides that, nothing," he testified. He described recruiting AI researcher Ilya Sutskever away from Google as a pivotal moment in the company's early history, noting: "After I recruited Ilya to OpenAI, Larry Page refused to speak to me ever again." Musk described Sutskever as one of the top three AI researchers in the world at the time and said he was "critical to the success of the company."
Musk's founding charter of OpenAI, entered into evidence during the trial, declared that OpenAI would seek to create "open source technology for the public benefit" and would be "not organized for the private gain of any person." Musk argued the company's current trajectory — it is now valued at approximately $852 billion — represents a fundamental betrayal of those principles.
But cross-examination by OpenAI's lead attorney William Savitt surfaced significant complications for Musk's narrative. Savitt challenged Musk on his unfulfilled funding pledge and on evidence suggesting Musk had himself expressed interest in a for-profit structure at OpenAI before leaving the organization. The exchange was openly contentious. At one point Musk fired back at Savitt: "Few answers are going to be complete especially when you cut me off all the time."
Judge Gonzalez Rogers at times admonished Savitt for not allowing Musk to finish his thoughts — but she had already made clear before the trial began that she had concerns about the litigation's broader framing. According to ABC7, the judge told Musk's lawyers that people "don't want to put the future of humanity into Mr. Musk's hands," and instructed the parties not to discuss the dangers of AI to humanity during proceedings.
A Bombshell Admission and a Procedural Controversy
The most striking moment of the week may have come when Musk acknowledged under testimony — to audible gasps in the courtroom, according to MIT Technology Review — that his own AI company xAI, which makes the chatbot Grok, uses OpenAI's models to train its own systems. Musk did not dispute the fact, instead framing it as industry-standard practice: "It is standard practice to use other AIs to validate your AI," he said.
The admission hands OpenAI's defense a potentially useful rhetorical tool: the plaintiff's own AI venture relies, at least in part, on the very technology at the center of the dispute.
Also notable was Musk's own self-assessment of his early role. In what appeared to be a moment of blunt candor, he testified: "I was a fool who provided them free funding to create a startup."
The week also produced a procedural controversy involving Jared Birchall, described as Musk's money manager, who testified after Musk concluded his time on the stand. While the jury was out of the room, Birchall answered a question he was not supposed to answer. Judge Gonzalez Rogers stated she would decide how to handle his testimony in the coming days.
Sam Altman was notably absent from the courtroom for the entirety of Musk's testimony, though co-founder Greg Brockman remained present throughout.
Opening Statements Set the Battleground
Before Musk took the stand, opening statements from both sides framed the trial's central conflict in starkly opposing terms.
Musk's lead attorney Steven Molo told the court: "They enriched themselves, they made themselves more powerful, and they breached the very basic principles on which the charity was founded."
OpenAI's lead attorney William Savitt offered a pointed counter-narrative, arguing the lawsuit is rooted in competitive grievance rather than principle. "We are here because Mr. Musk turned out to be very wrong about OpenAI. We're here now because Mr. Musk now competes with OpenAI," Savitt told the jury. He added: "My clients had the nerve to go on and succeed without him. Mr. Musk did not like that."
The nine-person jury will advise Judge Gonzalez Rogers on liability, but the judge herself will decide any remedies. Jury selection drew a pool of potential jurors approximately three times larger than typical for a civil case, reflecting the extraordinary public profile of the parties involved.
Why This Trial Has Consequences Far Beyond the Courtroom
The Musk v. Altman trial is not simply a dispute between two of the most prominent figures in the technology industry. Its outcome could carry significant implications for how AI companies are structured, governed, and held accountable to their founding missions.
OpenAI's corporate structure has already undergone substantial change. A for-profit subsidiary was established in 2019 and was subsequently converted into a public benefit corporation overseen by the nonprofit foundation in 2025, with the attorneys general of California and Delaware approving the shift. Whether that transition satisfies — or deepens — Musk's grievances is one of the questions the jury will be asked to weigh.
Microsoft, named as a co-defendant, is accused of aiding and abetting OpenAI's alleged breach of charitable trust. The company's substantial investment in and partnership with OpenAI makes it a significant presence in the proceedings even if its executives have not yet taken center stage.
The financial stakes are enormous on both sides. OpenAI's current valuation of approximately $852 billion reflects its transformation into one of the most commercially successful AI companies in the world. A ruling ordering a reversion to nonprofit status or awarding billions in damages could reshape the company's trajectory — and potentially affect its plans for a public offering. Meanwhile, xAI is expected to go public as part of SpaceX as early as June 2026 at a target valuation of $1.75 trillion, meaning Musk himself has substantial financial interests riding on the outcome and his public credibility in the AI space.
Prediction markets offered a real-time gauge of how observers were reading the first week. After Musk's first day of testimony, traders on Kalshi dropped his odds of winning the lawsuit to approximately 53.5% — a fall of about 8 percentage points — suggesting that Musk's opening performance under cross-examination generated some skepticism about his case.
The Judge's Warning and the Social Media Question
Before the trial commenced, Judge Gonzalez Rogers scolded Musk for social media posts about the case and threatened to impose a gag order. All three primary parties — Musk, Altman, and Brockman — agreed to limit their social media activity about the suit. The judge's instruction to the courtroom was direct: "All of you try to control your propensity to use social media to make things worse outside this courtroom."
The warning underscores the unusual challenge of managing a trial in which both principal parties are among the most followed individuals on the internet and in which public opinion, market sentiment, and courtroom proceedings are all running in parallel.
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What Comes Next in Musk v. Altman
The trial is scheduled to continue through late May 2026. Expert witnesses listed for Musk's side include Stuart J. Russell, a science professor and AI researcher at UC Berkeley and founder of the Center for Human-Compatible Artificial Intelligence, and David M. Schizer, a Columbia Law professor, dean emeritus, and tax scholar. Their testimony is expected to address both the technical and legal dimensions of OpenAI's structural evolution.
Sam Altman has not yet testified, and his time on the stand will likely be among the most watched moments of the remaining weeks. Judge Gonzalez Rogers still needs to rule on the handling of Jared Birchall's testimony following the procedural irregularity from the trial's fourth day.
The central questions before the jury — whether OpenAI breached its charitable trust, whether Microsoft aided that breach, and what Musk's actual motivations are — remain unresolved. The first week established the contested terrain; the remaining weeks will determine which side has built the stronger case on it.
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