{"id":9004,"date":"2022-09-27T23:08:12","date_gmt":"2022-09-27T17:08:12","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.bnc24.com\/en\/?p=9004"},"modified":"2022-09-27T23:08:12","modified_gmt":"2022-09-27T17:08:12","slug":"twitter-to-interview-elon-musk-known-for-combative-testimony","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.bnc24.com\/en\/tech\/2022\/09\/27\/news\/9004\/","title":{"rendered":"Twitter to interview Elon Musk, known for combative testimony"},"content":{"rendered":"
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Tesla and SpaceX Chief Executive Officer Elon Musk speaks at the SATELLITE Conference and Exhibition in Washington on March 9, 2020. (AP)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

WILMINGTON, Delaware, Broadcasting News Corporation : Billionaire Elon Musk\u2019s tendency to dish out insults while being questioned under oath will be tested anew this week, when lawyers for Twitter Inc. are expected to interview the Tesla Inc. CEO about his abrupt decision in July to ditch his $44 billion deal for the social media company. Testifying in past legal battles, the world\u2019s richest person has called opposing attorneys \u201creprehensible,\u201d questioned their happiness and accused them of \u201cextortion.\u201d He asked one attorney if he was working on a contingency because the lawyer\u2019s client was allegedly behind on child support payments.
\n\u201cSo probably you\u2019re on a contingency or you\u2019re taking that kid\u2019s money. Which is it?\u201d Musk asked a lawyer for a whistleblower in a case against Tesla, according to a transcript of the 2020 deposition.
\nThe high-stakes Twitter interview is closed to the public. A court filing last week said the Musk deposition was scheduled to begin on Monday and run into Wednesday, if needed. Sources with knowledge of the deposition said Musk was not questioned on Monday and they did not know what day it would begin nor did they give a reason for the delay. Musk\u2019s lawyers will want to keep him focused on answering questions, but that can be a challenge with such a smart and opinionated witness, said James Morsch, a corporate litigator who is not involved in the court battle. \u201cI would compare it to trying to hold a tiger by his tail,\u201d Morsch said. In a 2019 deposition in litigation over Tesla\u2019s takeover of solar-panel maker SolarCity, Musk refused five times to answer one of the initial questions because of the way it was worded, the transcript shows. \u201cWe can stare at each other until you rephrase it,\u201d Musk told opposing attorney Randall Baron, according to a transcript. \u201cI\u2019ll guess we\u2019ll just cancel this deposition,\u201d Baron responded. Baron suggested that he would seek an order from the judge directing Musk to answer questions, which seemed to get things moving. Twitter declined to comment and Musk\u2019s legal team did not immediately respond to a request for comment. Twitter\u2019s attorneys are expected to use the interview to try to show that Musk abandoned the deal due to falling financial markets and not because the company misled him about the real number of users or hid security flaws, as he alleged. Musk wants a judge to allow him to walk away without penalty, while Twitter wants an order forcing him to buy the company for $54.20 per share. Twitter\u2019s stock ended up 0.4 percent at $41.58 on Friday. A five-day trial is scheduled to begin on Oct. 17 in Wilmington, Delaware. Dozens of depositions are scheduled in the case, including of Twitter CEO Parag Agrawal, as each side questions witnesses and gathers evidence to make its case. Agrawal was scheduled to answer questions from Musk\u2019s lawyers at a law firm in San Francisco starting at 9 a.m. local time on Monday, according to a court filing, although sources said that deposition was also postponed and did not give a reason. Twitter co-founder and former Twitter CEO Jack Dorsey was scheduled to be deposed last week.
\nWHAT IS THE WHOLE TRUTH
\nMusk at times has shown in his depositions the charm and wit he deploys on Twitter, where he has built a cult-like following.
\nThe Twitter deposition atmosphere could be especially fraught. Its legal team includes the firm of Wachtell, Lipton, Rosen & Katz, and the main lawyer on the case, Bill Savitt, initially represented Musk and Tesla in the SolarCity deal, although not during discovery and depositions in the litigation. Savitt did not respond to a request for comment. Twitter is also represented by Wilson Sonsini Goodrich & Rosati. A constant in the three depositions reviewed by Reuters is Musk\u2019s dislike of attorneys representing the opposing side, who he accuses of \u201ctrickery\u201d and pursuing him merely for money. \u201cI heard yesterday that 3 percent of the US economy is legal services. That\u2019s one of the saddest facts I\u2019ve heard in a long time,\u201d Musk said to Baron, the lawyer in the SolarCity deposition. The deposition in the litigation with the Tesla whistleblower, Martin Tripp, who accused the company of wasting raw materials, began with Musk being asked if he understood the oath he took to testify truthfully. \u201cThis sounds like some sort of legalese, semantic argument. The \u2014 what is the whole truth of something?\u201d asked Musk, according to the transcript. \u201cYou say, \u2018Is that a tree? What kind of tree is it? Is it a tree with lots of leaves?\u2019 Or is \u2014 if you\u2019re saying something is a tree is the whole truth? No, of course not.\u201d
\nTripp\u2019s attorney reminded Musk that the judge warned he would oversee the deposition in person if questions weren\u2019t answered properly. \u201cDo you intend to comply with the judge\u2019s admonition there?\u201d asked attorney William Fishbach. \u201cOf course,\u201d Musk said. NEWS COLLECTED FROM ARAB NEWS.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

WILMINGTON, Delaware, Broadcasting News Corporation : Billionaire Elon Musk\u2019s tendency to dish out insults while being questioned under oath will be tested anew this week, when lawyers for Twitter Inc. are expected to interview the Tesla Inc. CEO about his abrupt decision in July to ditch his $44 billion deal for the social media company. …<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":9005,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[6],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-9004","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-tech"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.bnc24.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9004","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.bnc24.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.bnc24.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.bnc24.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.bnc24.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=9004"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.bnc24.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9004\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":9006,"href":"https:\/\/www.bnc24.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9004\/revisions\/9006"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.bnc24.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/9005"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.bnc24.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=9004"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.bnc24.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=9004"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.bnc24.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=9004"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}