Elon Musk failed to persuade a federal judge in Washington, DC to move a Securities and Exchange Commission Case over his late passing of his growing Twitter proportion to Texas, after he said he was too busy to defend himself in the country’s capital.
US district judge Sparkle Sooknanan said on Thursday that she “takes Mr Musk’s convenience seriously”, but the world’s richest person has “significant means” and spends at least 40% of her time outside of Texas.
“In fact,” she wrote, “Mr Musk’s brief himself indicates that he has spent considerable time here this year,” as he operated the Department of Government Efficiency.
Sooknanan also said that Texas judges have greater caseloads than in her court and that she could continue with “reasonably alacrity.”
When he tried to move the case, Musk said he was an “incredibly busy person” who works 80 plus hours and often sleeps in the office or factory and that Washington lawsuits would impose “significant burdens.”
Lawyers for Musk did not immediately respond to requests for comment. A spokesperson for SEC had no comments quoting the government’s shutdown. Musk’s fortune surpassed $ 500 billion for the first time on Wednesday.
SEC sued Musk in January and said his 11-day delay in revealing his original 5% Twitter share in early 2022 allowed him to buy more than $ 500 million of shares at artificially low prices.
It wants Musk to pay a civilian fine and give up $ 150 million, which he allegedly saved at the expense of unsuspecting investors. Musk is trying to reject the case. He bought the whole Twitter for $ 44 billion in October 2022 and renamed it X.
Musk lives in Austin and his companies Tesla, SpaceX and Boring Tunnel Business are based in Texas.
Sooknanan rejected Musk’s alternative proposal to move the SEC case to Manhattan, where former Twitter shareholders are suing him.
