Federal jury rules against Musk, dismissing multi-billion-dollar lawsuit against OpenAI, Altman and Microsoft

OAN Staff Brooke Mallory
6:24 PM – Monday, May 18, 2026

In a dramatic conclusion to one of the most media-frenzied legal battles in tech history, a California federal jury ruled unanimously against Elon Musk on Monday, dismissing his multi-billion-dollar lawsuit against OpenAI, its CEO Sam Altman, and tech giant Microsoft.

Following a three-week trial that captivated the Silicon Valley landscape, the nine-person advisory jury took less than two hours to deliberate.

They concluded that Musk had waited too long to file his claims, meaning the world’s wealthiest man ultimately lost his massive legal gambit due to the statute of limitations expiration, rather than a definitive ruling on the trial’s core merits.

The lawsuit, originally filed by Musk in 2024, centered on allegations that Altman and OpenAI President Greg Brockman had fundamentally betrayed the AI startup’s founding principles.

Musk, who co-founded OpenAI in 2015 and donated roughly $38 million to its early non-profit operations, accused the executives of “stealing a charity” and shifting into an aggressive, commercial moneymaking machine behind his back.

Musk sought sweeping remedies from the court, including $150 billion in damages to be paid out to charitable efforts, the removal of Altman and Brockman from leadership roles, and the complete dismantling of OpenAI’s heavily funded for-profit corporate structure.

The defense, however, neutralized Musk’s arguments by focusing heavily on timelines. OpenAI’s legal team successfully demonstrated that OpenAI had very publicly announced the creation of its capped-profit arm in March 2019, securing a $1 billion investment from Microsoft shortly thereafter.

Since California law dictates that breach-of-charitable-trust claims must be brought within three years of a plaintiff discovering the alleged breach, the jury determined that Musk had ample awareness of the company’s restructuring well before the August 2021 statutory cutoff.

Documents and emails presented during the trial even revealed that Musk himself had floated the idea of a for-profit structure for OpenAI as early as 2017 before leaving the board in 2018. U.S. District Judge Yvonne Gonzalez Rogers immediately accepted the advisory jury’s findings, dismissing the case on the spot and noting that a substantial amount of evidence supported the verdict.

Meanwhile, the ruling lifts a cloud of legal uncertainty over OpenAI, which recently commanded an $852 billion valuation during a February 2026 funding round, all the while actively positioning itself for an initial public offering. The decision also solidifies the financial safety of Microsoft’s $13 billion investment, “protecting an economic stake” currently valued at more than $228 billion, according to analysts.

Neither Musk nor Altman were present in the courtroom when the verdict was delivered. Musk, who spent part of the trial’s final days traveling to China with a presidential delegation, slammed the outcome on his social media platform, X, calling it a “terrible precedent” and reiterating his stance that OpenAI’s leadership enriched themselves at the expense of a public charity.

“This illustrates why the ruling by the terrible activist Oakland judge, who simply used the jury as a fig leaf, creates such a terrible precedent,” said Musk in a since-deleted tweeted. “She just handed out a free license to loot charities if you can keep the looting quiet for a few years!”

“Regarding the OpenAI case, the judge & jury never actually ruled on the merits of the case, just on a calendar technicality. There is no question to anyone following the case in detail that Altman & Brockman did in fact enrich themselves by stealing a charity. The only question is WHEN they did it! I will be filing an appeal with the Ninth Circuit, because creating a precedent to loot charities is incredibly destructive to charitable giving in America. OpenAI was founded to benefit all of humanity,” Musk later posted on X.

 

While OpenAI’s legal counsel expressed confidence and joy over the resolution, Musk’s legal team has already confirmed their intent to appeal the decision, ensuring that the bitter ideological rift between the former allies will likely continue in the appellate courts.

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