Judge denies billionaire Elon Musk’s request to delay Twitter trial

Elon Musk can incorporate claims from Twitter whistleblower Peiter “Mudge” Zatko into his countersuit against the social media company, but the legal proceedings must continue on schedule, a judge ruled.

The trial, set to begin on Oct. 17 in Delaware Chancery Court, will see the 51-year-old billionaire fight to wriggle out of his $44 billion deal to take over Twitter. While Musk’s legal team hoped to push the start date to mid-November, ChancellorKathaleen McCormick, the judge overseeing the case, said Wednesday that even a short delay could risk damage to Twitter that is “too great to justify.”

Tesla founder Elon Musk speaks at the ONS fair on sustainable energy in Stavanger, Norway, Aug. 29, 2022. (Carina Johansen/)

McCormick. in her five-page ruling obtained by the Daily News, also granted the SpaceX co-founder and his lawyers “incremental discovery relevant to the new allegations” raised by the whistleblower.

Twitter in April revealed that it had agreed to sell to Musk at a cost of $54.20 per share, but it’s been anything but smooth sailing in the weeks that have followed. Since mid-May, the Tesla CEO has repeatedly threatened to back out of the deal, claiming that the company has refused to give him an accurate tally of bots and fake accounts currently on the site. He finally filed a notice to scrap his Twitter takeover on July 8, prompting the social media company to file suit, and then Musk’s countersuit.

Zatko, Twitter’s former head of security, has raised several allegations against the micro-blogging platform, including that it has not been transparent about the number of fake accounts on the site and then misled investors about it. He also took specific issue with Twitter’s handling of users’ personal data and its dire security failures. The 51-year-old network security expert, whose previous employers include the Pentagon’s Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency and Google, joined Twitter in late 2020.

He was cut loose by the company in January.

“We are hopeful that winning the motion to amend takes us one step closer to the truth coming out in that courtroom,” Musk lawyer Alex Spiro of Quinn Emanuel said in a statement to CNBC.

McCormick’s ruling Wednesday comes a day after a tense court hearing during which both sides presented their respective arguments. A lawyer for Twitter unsuccessfully argued the whistleblower allegations would do little to boost Musk’s case, but that it would prove prejudicial for their own.

After The Washington Post published the claims last month, Twitter CEO Parag Agrawal described it as “a false narrative that is riddled with inconsistencies and inaccuracies, and presented without important context.”

Twitter has also repeatedly said it disclosed to the Securities and Exchange Commission an estimate that fewer than 5% of its user accounts are fake or spam, adding a disclaimer suggesting the number could be higher. The company added that Musk waived his rights to further due diligence when he signed on to the takeover back in April.

The world’s richest man is only now trying to escape the deal because it no longer suits his interest, according to Twitter.

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