July 14, 2025
Decide Harold Kahn dominated in Lemon’s favor after Musk’s crew tried to have the lawsuit moved to a Texas courtroom and tried to persuade a decide to have all of the claims thrown out.
A San Francisco decide dominated {that a} lawsuit from former CNN anchor Don Lemon towards former Division of Authorities Effectivity (DOGE) director and X proprietor Elon Musk for the canceled X partnership can go to trial, CNBC experiences.
Lemon filed the litigation in August 2024 after Musk canceled a partnership with the ex-CNN journalist simply hours after he wrapped up an interview with the billionaire. The tense change was scheduled to be the premiere of Lemon’s new present hosted on the social media app. The host of YouTube’s “The Don Lemon Present” and his legal professionals declare Musk and X dedicated “fraud by false promise” with “an implied contract” between the 2 events.
Decide Harold Kahn dominated in Lemon’s favor after Musk’s crew tried to have the lawsuit moved to a Texas courtroom and tried to persuade a decide to have all of the claims thrown out. Legal professional Carney Shegerian mentioned Kahn’s ruling holds Musk accountable for his actions. “The ruling means Don can maintain X and Musk accountable in open courtroom. Musk is topic to the authorized course of, similar to everybody else, and that’s vital,” Shegerian mentioned in an announcement, in keeping with Fox Enterprise.
“There’s no query about Musk’s motives and legal responsibility, as documented in his personal texts and on X for tens of millions to see.”
The controversial interview, scheduled to air in March 2023, included Lemon urgent Musk on plenty of sizzling subjects, with the billionaire pushing the so-called “nice substitute principle” and different bigoted tropes and falsehoods, reminiscent of posts that claimed there was a “Hispanic invasion” of immigrants to the U.S. The $1.5 million lawsuit claims Musk and X promised the journalist that he would have “full authority and management over the work he produced, even when disliked” by the Tesla founder and his crew.
Musk labeled the interview as “invasive and charged.” On the time, Lemon mentioned he was unaware of any restrictions. “There have been no restrictions on the interview that he willingly agreed to, and my questions have been respectful and wide-ranging, protecting every part from SpaceX to the presidential election,” the journalist as soon as mentioned.
Each Lemon and Musk have been underneath scrutiny over the previous few years, beginning when Musk took over the social app previously generally known as Twitter. Bearing on being a “free speech” hero, Musk restored President Donald Trump’s account after being completely banned following the Jan. 6 assaults on the U.S. Capitol, pushing extreme backlash.
Lemon was let go from CNN in 2023 following accusations of co-worker mistreatment and making sexist remarks on-air, reminiscent of some made towards former South Carolina Gov. Nikki Haley. Lemon later apologized for the feedback relating to Haley.
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