Musk’s AI empire is unraveling — the trial is just the beginning

On March 4, 2026, Elon Musk posted on X that “Tesla will be one of the companies to make AGI and probably the first to make it in humanoid/atom-shaping form.” Less than eight weeks later, under oath in an Oakland federal courtroom, he was asked whether Tesla has any concrete plans to pursue AGI. His answer: “No.”

That single contradiction — between what Musk tells his millions of followers and what he admits when he’s facing perjury charges — captures the story of his decade-long obsession with artificial intelligence better than any timeline ever could. But here’s a timeline anyway, because the trial of Musk v. Altman is now exposing, under oath, what many of us have long suspected: Musk’s AI ambitions were never about safety, open access, or benefiting humanity. They were about control.

Last year, I wrote about cracks forming in Elon Musk’s armor of lies — how the convergence of the Tesla shareholder lawsuit over xAI and OpenAI’s countersuit was starting to expose Musk’s contradictions. Thirteen months later, those cracks have become chasms. The Musk v. Altman trial, now in its second week, is producing daily revelations that connect directly to Tesla shareholders.

Here’s the updated timeline.