Billionaire Elon Musk is being sued by the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) in connection to his much-talked-about $44 billion takeover of Twitter.
The US financial regulator said it was forced to file an application seeking an order directing Musk to comply with an investigative subpoena that was issued asking for his appearance for testimony. Musk failed to comply with the subpoena for a September 15 hearing.
The SEC sued Musk in San Francisco federal court on Thursday to get him to testify in its investigation into the deal, which is looking into potential violations of securities laws.
The SEC said: “Musk’s ongoing refusal to comply with the SEC’s administrative subpoena is hindering and delaying the SEC staff’s investigation to determine whether violations of the federal securities laws have occurred. Accordingly, the SEC now asks the Court to compel Musk to appear for investigative testimony.”
According to the filing, Musk failed to appear for testimony as required by SEC’s investigative subpoena, despite agreeing to appear on a mutually agreed upon date in September 2023. He was served with a subpoena in May 2023 requiring his appearance for testimony in the SEC’s San Francisco Regional Office on that mutually agreed upon date. Musk did not object to the subpoena from May 2023 until two days before his scheduled testimony date in September.
In the filing, SEC said: “Musk attempted to justify his refusal to comply with the subpoena by raising, for the first time, several spurious objections”.
These objections included San Francisco as an appropriate testimony location.
The SEC “offered to conduct Musk’s testimony at the SEC’s Fort Worth, Texas office (the closest SEC office to Musk’s current personal residence) or any other of the Commission’s offices, and proposed multiple dates in October and November 2023. These good faith efforts were met with Musk’s blanket refusal to appear for testimony.”
Alex Spiro, Musk’s private lawyer, in an emailed statement to various media outlets, said: “The SEC has already taken Mr Musk’s testimony multiple times in this misguided investigation. Enough is enough.”
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