A Delaware judge on Monday reassigned several lawsuits involving Elon Musk after lawyers for the Tesla CEO accused her of bias over a LinkedIn post that appeared to mock the billionaire.
In a filing, Delaware Court of Chancery Chancellor Kathaleen St. J. McCormick said that she will reassign a group of lawsuits to another judge after Musk’s lawyers pointed to a social media post in which she allegedly appeared to support in mockery of Musk.
Despite stepping aside, McCormick insisted that she is not biased against the tech mogul.
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“The motion for recusal rests on a false premise—that I support a LinkedIn post about Mr. Musk, which I do not in fact support,” the order states. “I am not biased against the defendants in these actions. In fact, I dismissed a suit against Mr. Musk just last year. The motion for recusal is denied.”
The cases will now be overseen by three other judges. McCormick noted that the “disproportionate media attention” surrounding her handling of the cases would be “detrimental to the administration of justice.”
“Fortunately, the Court of Chancery is far greater than any one person,” she wrote. “I have complete faith in the Vice Chancellors’ abilities to adjudicate these matters.”
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Lawyers for Musk cited McCormick’s social media activity, saying she used a “support” emoji on LinkedIn on a post that celebrated his loss in a separate California case. The post cited Musk being liable for tweets he posted in 2022 about his $44 billion Twitter purchase in which he allegedly misled investors.
McCormick presided over that case.
The lawyers said one of McCormick’s staff members also liked another anti-Musk post related to Musk’s pending litigation.
“This post to which the Court reacted and another to which a Court staff member reacted are not simply negative criticism of Mr. Musk and his attorneys, they are inflammatory,” Musk’s lawyers wrote.
McCormick later deactivated her LinkedIn account.
“I either did not click the ‘support’ icon at all, or I did so accidentally,” McCormick wrote in a letter to attorneys in the case. “I do not believe that I did it accidentally.”
In another lawsuit, McCormick in 2024 voided a multibillion-dollar pay package for Musk and the Tesla board, saying they had breached their fiduciary duties and that Musk effectively controlled the board. The Delaware Supreme Court reinstated the pay package but upheld McCormick’s underlying findings.
Musk responded that year to an X post from a conservative influencer about McCormick, writing “absolute corruption” after the influencer noted that she had previously worked at a Delaware law firm that donated to former President Joe Biden.
FOX Business’ Ashley Oliver contributed to this report.
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