Photo: The B Word
Musk has requested that a judge block the SEC’s oversight of his Twitter posts, saying it’s being used to “trample” his free speech, according to Bloomberg.
The news was established in a court filing on Tuesday, referring to an agreement established after a 2018 tweet from Musk said he was considering taking Tesla private and had funding secured — which Musk said in a court filing was “entirely truthful.”
Tesla and CEO Elon Musk are facing a subpoena from the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC), after the 2018 tweet from the CEO was ruled to have violated securities laws and instituted an oversight agreement.
In a court affidavit, Musk also said he was “forced to sign” the agreement with the SEC because of “unrelenting regulatory pressure,” claiming also that “Tesla was a less mature company” than it is now.
“I never lied to shareholders,” said Musk, noting “I would never lie to shareholders. I entered into the consent decree for the survival of Tesla, for the sake of its shareholders.”
Both Elon and brother Kimbal Musk are under investigation by the SEC as of last month, over whether each of them violated securities laws when selling shares in Tesla.
Musk also claimed that the SEC leaked secret information in the federal probe, just days after calling the SEC investigation “unfounded,” saying the agency was harassing Tesla.
U.S. Labor Secretary Marty Walsh reached out to Musk over the weekend saying he was “willing to have a conversation” with the CEO, amidst an ongoing racial discrimination case against Tesla’s Fremont Factory.
