OpenAI's Sam Altman takes the stand to fend off Elon Musk's accusations he 'stole a charity'

Business OpenAI's Sam Altman takes the stand to fend off Elon Musk's accusations he 'stole a charity' May 12, 20265:58 PM ET John Ruwitch OpenAI CEO Sam Altman walks inside the federal courthouse during a recess in the proceedings in the trial over Elon Musk's lawsuit against OpenAI in Oakland, California, on May 12, 2026. JOSH EDELSON/AFP via Getty Images hide caption toggle caption JOSH EDELSON/AFP via Getty Images OpenAI CEO Sam Altman took the stand on Tuesday to defend himself against accusations from co-founder-turned-adversary Elon Musk that he "stole a charity" by converting the maker of ChatGPT into a for-profit juggernaut. Business Musk vs. Altman: Tech CEOs head to court over the fate of OpenAI The trial, now in its third week, pits two of the tech world's biggest personalities against one another in a high-stakes clash that could usher in major changes for one of the world's leading artificial intelligence companies and potentially alter the AI landscape. Musk's lawyers made the case that OpenAI, Altman and OpenAI president Greg Brockman, with the help of investments from Microsoft, jettisoned OpenAI's founding mission of being a non-profit focused on creating advanced AI for the benefit of humanity. Instead, the Musk team argues that they enriched themselves by creating a for-profit subsidiary that now effectively controls the nonprofit. Sponsor Message Business Elon Musk testifies against OpenAI, seeking Sam Altman's ouster Business Elon Musk accuses OpenAI's leaders of 'looting the nonprofit' in court testimony OpenAI's legal team has argued that Musk is motivated by sour grapes and is out to damage a competitor. And on the stand Tuesday, Altman pushed back against the notion that Musk actually cares about OpenAI. "Mr. Musk did try to kill it," he said, adding that Musk launched a competitor called xAI, tried to poach its talent, and alleged that he engaged in "business interference." The dispute goes back nearly a decade to when the founders of OpenA...