Elon Musk vs. Altman: If He Loses the Lawsuit, the Bottom Line of U.S. Charity Will Be Exposed

On the first day of the trial, the judge said a blunt truth: “Many people do indeed dislike Elon Musk.”
U.S. District Court, Oakland, April 28, 2026.
The world’s richest man sits face-to-face with the CEO of the world’s most powerful AI company on opposite sides of the courtroom.
Musk clenches his teeth, his tongue pressed against the inside of his cheek, flipping through his notes.
Altman has his arms crossed, expressionless, whispering to his lawyer.
This isn’t a business war. This is war.
$130 billion in damages sought. Demanding Altman be removed. Demanding OpenAI return to non-profit status.
If Musk wins, the OpenAI empire valued at $730 billion will collapse in an instant.
If Musk loses… then all charitable organizations in the United States, starting today, will be sitting ducks awaiting slaughter.
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Opening statements by both sides’ lawyers
Musk’s lawyer’s version:
This is a drama about “a knight of light taking out greedy villains.”
OpenAI’s 2015 charter says—“for the benefit of all humanity.”
Not “a tool to make people rich.”
Altman and Brockman “stole a charity.”
Microsoft’s $13 billion investment shattered the promises to pieces.
Musk says that he won’t take a single cent of the money from winning the case—every cent goes to OpenAI’s non-profit division.
Altman’s lawyer’s version:
This is “revenge after a failed coup by a powerful official.”
“We’re here because Musk didn’t get what he wanted.”
What did he want back then? Absolute control. To directly merge OpenAI into Tesla.
Guess what? Altman and Brockman said “No.”
Musk walked away in 2018. He even wrote emails saying OpenAI’s chance of success was zero.
It wasn’t until 2023, when he launched xAI himself and ChatGPT exploded, that he came back to sue.
Isn’t that sour grapes? Judge for yourself.
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Musk spoke for half an hour about a lumberjack story, then suddenly threw out “species discriminators.”
In the witness stand, Musk didn’t start by talking about AI.
He spent half an hour recounting how he left South Africa at 17, worked as a lumberjack in Canada, and did farm work.
Working 80 to 100 hours a week, with no vacation home and no yacht.
—“I like working.”
Then the story took a turn.
He predicted: next year, AI will be smarter than any human.
Developing AI is like raising an “extremely smart child.” You can’t control it at all. You can only pray that the values you teach will be useful.
“We don’t want a Terminator ending.”
Then he dropped a bombshell.
He and Google cofounder Larry Page were once good friends.
In one conversation, Page was completely unconcerned about AI going out of control. Musk said no—human survival must come first.
Page snapped at him on the spot: “You’re a species discriminator.”
What does that mean?
In Page’s eyes, silicon-based AI life is equal to carbon-based human life. And even—AI is a more advanced direction of evolution.
Musk thought Page was crazy right then.
It was precisely because he feared Google would monopolize AI that he put money into OpenAI, acting as “a counterforce to Google.”
Sounds pretty heroic, right?
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But then the back-and-forth exposure started right away
Musk’s camp’s ace in the hole:
Altman’s private diary as OpenAI president from 2017.
In black and white, it says:
“Our plan: it would be great if we could make money from those funds. We’ve always thought maybe we should go directly for profit.”
And there’s an even more blunt line:
“Financially, what can make me earn $1 billion?”
Five years before ChatGPT even existed, they were already plotting how to become billionaires.
Altman’s camp’s counterattack:
In 2017, Musk demanded sole control in an email.
He was absolutely not just “a donor who gives money without asking questions.”
When Altman and Brockman refused to hand over control—
In 2018, Musk wrote an email: OpenAI’s chance of success was zero.
Then he pulled out investment and left.
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A detail that’s chilling when you think about it: is the mother of three children an insider?
The trial also brought up a name: Xiheven Zilis.
She is a former OpenAI board member.
She is also an executive at Musk’s brain-computer interface company Neuralink.
And she is the mother of Musk’s three children.
Text messages show that she had proactively asked Musk: should she continue staying on OpenAI’s board to keep you posted?
Based on this, OpenAI’s lawyers accuse her of being an insider planted by Musk during her time on the board.
Under the shell of idealism, layer by layer gets peeled away—inside is all about money, power, and control.
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No matter who wins this lawsuit, there will be no winners
If Musk wins:
OpenAI will be forced to revert to pure non-profit.
The $730 billion valuation will vanish into thin air.
The IPO plan is directly scrapped.
But won’t capital just stop chasing AI? Impossible.
Musk’s own xAI will have one fewer strongest opponent.
If Altman wins:
That loophole will be torn wide open—
From now on, all tech entrepreneurs can play this game:
First, hide behind the “non-profit” banner to secure tax exemptions, gain public trust, and attract top talent.
Once the technology breakthrough happens, immediately switch to profit, go private, and cash out for themselves.
“Charities get looted” becomes legal from then on.
During the court session, Judge Rogers created a small interruption: the microphone and the display screen malfunctioned.
She said helplessly, “What can I say? We’re the federal government paying for this.”
The courtroom erupted in laughter.
On one side are cases involving sums of several hundreds of billions of dollars, the survival of humanity, and a Terminator crisis.
On the other side is a federal court that can’t even fix a microphone.
Is that magical?
But even more magical than that is this—
No matter how fiercely the courtroom is argued, GPU clusters around the world keep roaring day and night, crazily devouring electricity and data.
The wheels of AI won’t wait for anyone’s verdict.
Do you think Musk is truly afraid AI will destroy humanity—or that he just didn’t get the grapes?