‘A consistent pattern of lying’: Musk v OpenAI trial exposes what insiders think of Sam Altman

OpenAI, despite its name, is usually extremely secretive about its operations. It promotes a carefully crafted image to the world. Over the course of Elon Musk’s case against the startup and its CEO Sam Altman, however, the artificial intelligence firm has been forced to publicly contend with some of the messiest parts of its rise to power in public.

The Musk v OpenAI trial, which on Monday entered its third week, has featured a who’s who of Silicon Valley testifying about OpenAI’s past and its CEO’s contentious leadership. Musk’s attorneys have used former executives, private text messages, diary entries and internal email exchanges to portray Altman as untrustworthy. Altman, who denies Musk’s allegations, will take the stand in the coming days. OpenAI has likewise issued denials.

Although Musk’s case hinges on accusations that OpenAI and Altman broke a founding agreement by shifting the company from a nonprofit to a for-profit structure, the trial has often appeared to be more of a public relations battle than a debate over corporate governance. The history of internal drama at OpenAI, which includes a five-day saga in 2023 when Altman was effectively fired then rehired, has provided plenty of ammunition for that fight.

Altman’s leadership and trustworthiness have long been a subject of scrutiny in the tech industry and have been well chronicled in numerous profiles and books on OpenAI – including a recent New Yorker article that included other tech figures suggesting Altman showed deceptive tendencies. The trial has exposed even more details about OpenAI’s fractious corporate past than previously documented, as well as confirmed previously reported incidents through testimony under oath.

Altman’s former allies call him untrustworthy

In court last week, jurors heard video testimony from Mira Murati, OpenAI’s former chief technical officer, once a very close associate of Altman, in which she accused him of “creating chaos” at the company. Murati, who left OpenAI in 2024, testified that Altman had a pattern of “saying one thing to one person and completely the opposite to another person”.

The court also viewed text messages from Altman to Murati from 2023, during a brief period when OpenAI’s board ousted him as CEO after accusing him of being misleading in his conduct. Before he was reinstated five days later amid an internal power struggle, Altman texted Murati a series of questions about how the board was weighing his fate. She pointed to a very different future than the one that would come to pass, one in which Altman was cast out for good.

“Can you indicate directionally good or bad?” Altman texted Murati about his prospects.

“Directionally very bad,” Murati responded.

“Ok,” Altman replied.

Murati was one of several witnesses who testified about Altman’s personal and professional conduct. Former board member Helen Toner, who backed Altman’s ouster, told the court in a video deposition that there was a “pattern of behavior related to his honesty and candor” that led to Altman’s removal. Natasha McCauley, another former OpenAI board member, alleged in her deposition that Altman caused “repeated crisis events” through his leadership.

Musk’s lawyers on Monday also called OpenAI co-founder and former chief scientist Ilya Sutskever to the stand to testify. Sutskever, who was another member of the board that ousted Altman and left OpenAI in 2024, stated that he had held concerns about Altman’s running of the company and truthfulness.

“You told the board that Altman ‘exhibits a consistent pattern of lying, undermining his execs and pitting his execs against one another’,” Musk’s lawyer Steven Molo asked Sutskever.

“Yes,” Sutskever responded.

“That was clearly your view at that time,” Molo asked.

“Yes,” Sutskever replied.

‘Amateur city’: Microsoft’s CEO criticizes OpenAI’s board on the stand

Musk’s attorney also questioned Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella on Monday about the 2023 OpenAI blowup and Altman, with Nadella giving his own perspective on the chaotic attempt at driving Altman away – an event that OpenAI employees would later refer to as “the blip”. Microsoft at the time was OpenAI’s largest investor by a large margin.

“Whenever I’ve asked explicitly why Sam was fired, they never gave me, that I remember, a specific reason,” Nadella responded. “I never got clarity from anyone on that,” he added.

Under questioning from Microsoft’s own lawyer, Nadella criticized the OpenAI board that tried to remove Altman for creating instability and its poor communication.

“It was sort of amateur-city as far as I’m concerned,” Nadella testified, adding, “I was very worried that the employees were going to leave en masse.”

Musk’s own mess

OpenAI and Altman have denied all of Musk’s allegations and argued that his case is part of a pattern of harassment motivated by personal jealousy of OpenAI’s success. The jury has also heard testimony about the Tesla CEO’s own erratic behavior. OpenAI’s president Greg Brockman claimed last week that Musk became irate and “stormed around the table” at a meeting shortly before the billionaire left the company in 2018.

OpenAI’s attorneys alleged in a filing that Musk reached out to Brockman to settle the case two days before the trial, then became threatening when Brockman refused to meet his demands.

“By the end of this week, you and Sam will be the most hated men in America. If you insist, so it will be,” Musk texted Brockman two days before the trial began, according to a court filing.

Musk is seeking the removal of Altman and Brockman, as well as $134bn to be redistributed to OpenAI’s nonprofit and the undoing of its for-profit structure. The trial’s closing arguments are set to take place on Thursday.