Scam Altman, Greg Stockman: Why is Elon Musk escalating OpenAI fight

As the high-stakes legal battle between Elon Musk and Sam Altman formally kicked off on April 27, the billionaire entrepreneur sharpened his attacks, taking direct aim at OpenAI’s leadership in a strongly worded post on X.

In a post that quickly gained traction online, Musk referred to Altman as “Scam Altman” and OpenAI president Greg Brockman as “Greg Stockman,” accusing the duo of betraying the organisation’s founding principles.

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Scam Altman and Greg Stockman?

“Scam Altman and Greg Stockman stole a charity. Full stop.

Greg got tens of billions of stock for himself and Scam got dozens of OpenAI side deals with a piece of the action for himself, Y Combinator style. After this lawsuit, Scam will also be awarded tens of billions in stock directly.

The fundamental question is simply this:

Do you want to set legal precedent in the United States that it is ok to loot a charity? If so, you undermine all charitable giving in the United States forever.

I could have started OpenAI as a for-profit corporation. Instead, I started it, funded it, recruited critical talent and taught them everything I know about how to make a startup successful FOR THE PUBLIC GOOD.

Then they stole the charity.”

Musk’s remarks came in response to a post by OpenAI, which dismissed the lawsuit as baseless and motivated by rivalry.

“We can’t wait to make our case in court where both the truth and the law are on our side. This lawsuit has always been a baseless and jealous bid to derail a competitor. We’ll also finally have the chance to question Mr. Musk under oath before a jury of Californians about this attempt to undermine our work to ensure that artificial general intelligence benefits all of humanity,” OpenAI said in a post on X.

Why did Musk sue OpenAI? 

The courtroom clash traces back to a lawsuit Musk filed in 2024, accusing OpenAI of abandoning its founding mission as a non-profit focused on building artificial intelligence for the public good.

Founded in 2015 by Musk, Altman, Brockman, Ilya Sutskever, Wojciech Zaremba and John Schulman, OpenAI was originally structured as a non-profit. Musk claims he contributed roughly $38 million on the understanding that the organisation would remain open-source and non-commercial.

The lawsuit alleges that Altman and Brockman “intentionally courted and deceived Musk,” persuading him to fund what was presented as a non-profit initiative before pivoting to a profit-driven structure, bolstered by its deep partnership with Microsoft.

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Musk is seeking damages of up to $134 billion, funds he says should go to OpenAI’s non-profit arm and has also asked the court to remove Altman as CEO.

How did OpenAI respond to Musk?

OpenAI has rejected the claims, arguing that Musk’s exit from the company stemmed from a failed power struggle rather than principle.

According to the company, Musk had sought full control of OpenAI and even proposed merging it with Tesla. When those demands were not accepted, he walked away.

OpenAI also pushed back on Musk’s financial claims, stating that his $38 million contribution was a donation, not an investment, and was used entirely to further the organisation’s mission.

The company maintains that its goal of building artificial general intelligence that benefits humanity remains unchanged, framing Musk’s legal challenge as part of a broader competitive rivalry, including his own AI venture, xAI.