Judge who held Tesla stock recuses himself in Elon Musk’s X case

The judge overseeing X’s lawsuit against advertisers has recused himself following a news report that showed he owned shares of Tesla.

In a recusal notice dated Aug. 13, U.S. District Judge Reed O’Connor in Texas backed out of X’s case against the World Federation of Advertisers, which was filed last week. The judge didn’t say why he was removing himself from the suit.

X, formerly known as Twitter, is owned by Elon Musk, who is also the CEO and largest shareholder in Tesla. On Monday, NPR reported that O’Connor had owned shares of Tesla in 2022, the date of his last available disclosure, posing a potential conflict of interest.

Calls for comment to the court’s clerk weren’t immediately returned.

In X’s lawsuit, the company accused a number of advertisers of engaging in antitrust behavior when they stopped ad campaigns on the site. Companies named include Unilever, Mars, CVS Healthcare and Orsted in Europe.

In response to the suit, the WFA said it was suspending the operations of its Global Alliance for Responsible Media nonprofit initiative.

The new judge assigned to the case, Judge Ed Kinkeade, issued an order on Tuesday that said either party would need to justify each request to the court to keep files submitted under seal and out of the public view.

O’Connor is a former aide to U.S. Sen. John Cornyn, R-Texas, and a former federal prosecutor in North Texas. For now, he remains the judge in another lawsuit filed by X against Media Matters for America, filed in November after the progressive watchdog published a report about Nazi content running on the app next to ads from companies.

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