The third week of the Elon Musk vs. OpenAI trial brought dramatic revelations and damaging testimony from former insiders, painting a picture of internal strife and credibility issues at the AI company.
Strange Evidence: The Donkey Trophy
On the Wednesday of the trial's third week, before the jury was let in, an OpenAI lawyer approached the bench with a small object wrapped in white cloth. Judge Yvonne Gonzalez Rogers unwrapped it on the desk in front of her. It was a gold statue, about the size of a Little League trophy, depicting the rear half of a donkey—two legs, a tail, and a hindquarter—mounted on a small white base. The inscription read: "Never stop being a jackass for safety." The judge looked at it, set it down, and said, "I don't want it."
The trophy belonged to Josh Achiam, OpenAI's chief futurist, who joined the company as an intern in 2017. He testified later that morning about an all-hands meeting in early 2018, the same meeting where Elon Musk announced he was leaving OpenAI to pursue AGI at Tesla. Achiam had spoken up to say racing for AGI sounded reckless. By Achiam's account, Musk snapped and called him a jackass in front of fifty or sixty people. At the next all-hands, Dario Amodei and a colleague presented Achiam with the trophy, hand-engraved.
Musk, who testified in week one, had claimed under oath that he never called anyone at OpenAI a jackass. He might have used some "strong language," he allowed, or said "don't be a jackass," but not the word as a label aimed at a person. OpenAI's lawyers wanted the statue in evidence because it bore on this question. The judge ruled the testimony could come in, but the trophy could not. The jury never saw it, though photographs leaked out of the courtroom.
Shivon Zilis: The Mother of Musk's Children Testifies
Shivon Zilis, who served on OpenAI's board from 2020 to 2023 and advised the lab since 2016, took the stand in week two. She is the mother of four of Musk's children, three of them by IVF after what she described under oath as a one-off romantic encounter. She had originally signed on as a co-plaintiff to this lawsuit but quietly dropped out before trial.
Zilis testified in a black cardigan and black jeans, her voice small. She described her job for Musk as finding bottlenecks across his entire AI portfolio—Tesla, Neuralink, OpenAI—and solving them, 80 to 100 hours a week. She called this his "maniac mode." The gallery laughed once and then stopped.
Zilis had been the only person taking proper notes during the cofounder negotiations of 2017 and 2018, making her emails the trial's most-quoted exhibits. OpenAI's lawyer Sarah Eddy walked her through them one at a time. A 2017 brainstorming email listed structural options for OpenAI, including "switch to for profit in next couple of weeks (woah fast!)." Another email, to Musk's money manager Jared Birchall, explained that OpenAI's cofounders demanded an "ironclad agreement to not have Elon (or anyone) have absolute control of AGI." A third, from August 2017, flagged that Musk had silently halted his quarterly donations—two weeks before he told the cofounders.
Other documents were more troubling. In one brainstorm, Zilis floated folding OpenAI entirely into Tesla. In another, she asked whether they could "find a way to get Demis," referring to Demis Hassabis of DeepMind, whom Musk had long fixated on. Zilis's email confirmed the fixation: if Hassabis "hung around E," she wrote, "perhaps it would force him to think about humanity more."
The most damaging exhibit came from February 2018, around the time Musk left OpenAI's board. Zilis asked Musk: "Do you prefer I stay close and friendly with OpenAI to keep info flowing or begin to disassociate? Trust game is about to get tricky." Musk replied: "Close and friendly, but we are going to actively try to move three or four people from OpenAI to Tesla." Zilis told the jury she meant "trust framework," not "trust game." Eddy paused and moved to the next exhibit.
Another exchange from February 2023, as word leaked that Musk was building a rival AI lab, showed Zilis texting a friend about her impending resignation from the OpenAI board: "When the father of your babies starts a competitive effort and will recruit out of OpenAI there is nothing to be done." Her friend suggested Musk put her on the board of the new thing. Zilis said she was bummed.
By Thursday's closing argument, Eddy needed only one line to summarize Zilis's testimony: "Even the mother of his children can't back his story."
Sam Altman Under Fire: Witnesses Testify to Dishonesty
Sam Altman survived four hours on the stand, but the damage came from witnesses who weren't there. Both sides watched their own people testify against them. For OpenAI, that was Zilis. For Musk, it was a longer parade, most of it on video, most of it about Altman.
Mira Murati, OpenAI's former CTO, did not appear in person—she was at the Met Gala the week her deposition played in court. In her deposition, Murati described an incident where Altman told her OpenAI's legal team had cleared a new AI model from going through the company's deployment safety board. She called the head of legal directly to check, who told her no such thing had happened. Asked whether Altman had been telling her the truth, Murati said flatly: "No."
Her text exchanges with Altman from the November 2023 firing weekend produced the most quoted message: Altman, scrambling about whether he'd be reinstated, asked: "Can you indicate directionally good or bad?" Murati replied: "Directionally very bad. Sam this is very bad."
Helen Toner, the former board member who voted to fire Altman, described a "pattern of behavior" related to his "honesty and candor." She also delivered a quiet jab at Murati, saying she was "strikingly unsupportive" and "remarkably passive" after the firing, refusing to acknowledge that her own conversations with the board helped trigger the removal. "She was waiting to see which way the wind would blow," Toner said. "She didn't realize that she was the wind."
Tasha McCauley, another former board member, used the phrase "toxic culture of lying." Rosie Campbell and Daniel Kokotajlo, former safety researchers, also testified about their concerns.
By Tuesday of the third week, Steven Molo, Musk's lead counsel, finally got Altman on the stand. Molo opened with a piece of theatre: he stood up, faced the jury, and read aloud a list of names—Mira Murati, Helen Toner, Tasha McCauley, Ilya Sutskever, Dario Amodei, Daniela Amodei, Elon Musk—seven people who built OpenAI with Altman or worked closely under him, seven people who have publicly described him as dishonest. Altman, in a navy suit and lavender tie, sat still and told the jury he believed himself to be an honest businessman.
Under his own lawyer's questioning earlier, Altman had quietly walked back a 2023 statement to the U.S. Senate where he claimed he held no equity in OpenAI. He "misspoken," he explained; he did hold a passive stake via Y Combinator. He also conceded a roughly $1.6 billion personal stake in Helion, a nuclear fusion startup that signed a deal with OpenAI; a $600 million stake in Stripe, which has a deal with OpenAI; a stake in Reddit, which signed a licensing agreement with OpenAI in 2024; and a stake in Cerebras.
By Tuesday evening, the U.S. House Oversight Committee had opened a probe into Altman's potential conflicts of interest ahead of OpenAI's planned IPO. Six Republican state attorneys general wrote to the SEC asking for scrutiny. The Wall Street Journal published a detailed investigation by Wednesday morning.
Ilya Sutskever: The Chief Scientist Who Turned Against Altman
Ilya Sutskever, OpenAI's co-founder and former chief scientist, took the stand on Monday of week three. He spoke softly, made little eye contact, and looked unhappy throughout. He has not spoken to Altman in over a year, nor to Brockman in over fifteen months. OpenAI's lawyer told the judge he should be treated as a hostile witness.
Two key disclosures emerged. First, his vested shares in OpenAI's for-profit arm are worth about $7 billion, making him likely the third-largest individual shareholder. He has not worked at the company for two years. Second, Sutskever confirmed under oath every line of a 52-page memo he wrote for OpenAI's board in 2023, accusing Altman of "a consistent pattern of lying" and "undermining his execs and pitting his execs against one another."
He had spent roughly a year before the November 2023 firing collecting evidence on Altman's conduct but did not show it to Altman directly. "Because I felt that, had he become aware of these discussions," he said, "he would just find a way to make them disappear." His justification for then flipping and supporting Altman's return was that he panicked: "I felt that, had I not done this, the company would have been destroyed. I felt that this was a Hail Mary."
The most striking moment came when Judge Gonzalez Rogers asked Sutskever how he would compare the AI of 2018, when Musk left OpenAI, to the AI of today. Sutskever paused and replied: "I would describe it as the difference between an ant and a cat." In closing arguments, OpenAI's lawyers put up an image of a tiny ant beside a large pink cat on the courtroom screen, and the jury laughed.
Satya Nadella: Microsoft's Reluctant Defendant
Microsoft is technically a defendant in this trial, accused by Musk of aiding and abetting OpenAI's alleged breach of charitable trust by investing over $13 billion. Their strategy has been to appear present but not engaged. Satya Nadella took the stand on Monday, May 11, in a navy suit and powder-blue tie. He said he was "very proud" Microsoft took a chance on OpenAI and that he never received a complaint from Musk about Microsoft's investments.
His one moment of genuine annoyance came on the subject of the November 2023 firing. Asked why he supported Altman's reinstatement, Nadella said he repeatedly asked the OpenAI board for specifics on what Altman did wrong and never got any. "It was sort of amateur city, as far as I'm concerned." Both sides took the line as helpful to their case.
A 2022 internal Microsoft email surfaced where Nadella wrote: "I don't want to be IBM and OpenAI to be Microsoft." He explained he meant Microsoft should retain "self-sufficiency." He also conceded that by 2023, Microsoft was projecting $92 billion in returns on a $13 billion investment—a calculated bet that has paid back at roughly seven to one.
Closing Arguments and the Absent Plaintiff
Thursday morning's closing arguments began with a forty-minute argument about a television. Steven Molo had wheeled a 36-inch external monitor into the courtroom for his presentation but had not consulted OpenAI's lawyers, violating the judge's standing instruction. The judge looked tired: "What do I always tell you when you come in here? Talk to the other side." OpenAI's team said they didn't have the cable to use the monitor. Fifteen lawyers debated dongles. Eventually, one of Musk's lawyers carried the TV out upside down, cable dragging.
Sam Altman walked in just as the TV walked out. Molo's closing ran roughly two hours. He referred to Brockman as "Greg Altman" at one point. He told the jury Musk was not asking for money, prompting the judge to correct the record—Musk is in fact asking for $134 billion in damages. He produced an extended metaphor about a wooden bridge across a gorge with a sign reading: "Don't worry, this bridge is built on Sam Altman's version of the truth." Would the jury walk across it? "I don't think many people would."
Sarah Eddy went next for OpenAI, using the "even the mother of his children can't back his story" line. She finished in under fifty minutes. William Savitt followed, noting that Musk said "I don't recall" between 150 and 200 times during his testimony. He noted that Altman and Brockman were present in the courtroom and Musk was not. "Mr. Musk came to this court for exactly one witness," Savitt said. "Himself. Now he's in parts unknown."
Musk was, at that moment, in Beijing. He had flown out with Donald Trump on Air Force One during week three, in apparent defiance of a judge's order that he remain on recall. His own lawyer apologized for his absence. The judge said nothing on the record. Microsoft's lawyer got up last and made a five-minute case that the company should not have been a defendant. The jury was sent home for the weekend.
What the Trial Has Produced
Deliberations begin Monday. The verdict is advisory; Judge Gonzalez Rogers will decide legal questions herself. Musk wants $134 billion redirected to OpenAI's nonprofit, Altman and Brockman removed from their roles, and OpenAI's for-profit structure unwound. OpenAI wants to keep all three and proceed toward an IPO that could value the company at over a trillion dollars.
The legal questions are genuinely open. There is no written founding agreement that says OpenAI must remain a nonprofit. Musk's case rests on emails, blog posts, and conversations from a decade ago. OpenAI's defense is that Musk wanted the same things he is now suing for but wasn't given them. Both can be true.
What weeks two and three produced, regardless of the verdict, is a record. Seven former colleagues described Altman as dishonest. A House Oversight inquiry into his personal investments opened mid-trial. Six state attorneys general wrote to the SEC. A former chief scientist confirmed under oath a 52-page memo about Altman while disclosing a $7 billion shareholding. On the other side, Musk's longest-running confidante was shown to have functioned as a sustained information channel back to him during her board tenure. His testimony that he never called anyone a jackass sits next to a small gold trophy. His own emails were used to argue he wanted the for-profit restructuring he now sues to undo. His absence from closing arguments will be the last thing the jury sees of him.
The trial began as a fight over the future of a charity. What it has produced is a record of how the people running the most powerful technology of our time behave when they think nobody is watching. They keep diaries. They text each other "directionally very bad." They commission small gold trophies of donkeys' backsides. They negotiate equity structures over whiskey. They threaten each other by SMS forty-eight hours before opening arguments.
The donkey trophy is back in OpenAI's lawyer's office. The judge has confirmed she does not want it. Whichever way the jury rules on Monday, somebody is going to have to find somewhere to put it.
