Musk in Court: Flat, Unprepared, and Way Too Into Himself

I’ve seen Elon Musk in court before. During his defamation trial a few years back, he turned on the charm, played to the jury, and walked away with a not-guilty verdict. Today, in Musk v. Altman, he looked like a completely different person.

The first witness sworn in was Musk himself, and I was surprised by how flat he seemed. No swagger. No showmanship. Just a guy who looked adrift, fumbling through questions that should have been second nature. The only time he showed any real animation was when he started listing everything he’d done for OpenAI. That part he knew cold.

Direct examination is basically a structured storytelling exercise. The lawyer asks questions to build a clear narrative for the jury. So when your lawsuit is about Sam Altman allegedly abandoning OpenAI’s mission, you’d expect the testimony to focus on that. Instead, Musk spent a weird amount of time talking about himself. Recounting his own achievements. Repeating how much he contributed. It felt less like making a case and more like an audition for a biopic.

I get it — Musk has a huge ego, and he’s never been shy about it. But this was a courtroom, not a podcast. The judge wasn’t nodding along. The jury looked bored. And Altman’s lawyers were probably taking notes on every self-aggrandizing tangent.

Honestly, the whole thing came across as petty. Instead of laying out a clean argument about mission drift or bad faith, Musk just seemed pissed that Altman is running the show now. That’s not a legal strategy. That’s a grudge.

I don’t know how this trial ends, but if day one is any indication, Musk’s legal team has their work cut out for them. You can’t win a case by proving you’re the smartest guy in the room — especially when the room is a federal courthouse.