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Elon Musk is bringing lawsuits to Texas. A judge with Tesla stock keeps hearing them
U.S. Federal Judge Reed O’Connor has been a longtime active member of the Federalist Society. In 2018, he spoke on a panel at the annual Texas Chapters Conference.
The Federalist Society/Screenshot by NPR
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The Federalist Society/Screenshot by NPR
Billionaire Elon Musk seems to have found a new favorite federal judge: Reed O’Connor in Fort Worth, Texas.
Musk’s social media company X has filed two major lawsuits against groups he sees as antagonists, and O’Connor is presiding over both of them, even though none of the parties is based in Texas.
So far, O’Connor has delivered stunningly pro-Musk decisions, which have gained widespread attention.
What has garnered less attention: O’Connor’s investment in Tesla, between “$15,001 and $50,000” of Tesla stock, according to his most recent publicly available financial disclosure filing.
That investment has fueled questions over O’Connor’s fairness as a judge, since the outcome of the suits filed by Musk’s X could impact his business empire.
“It is absolutely reasonable to question his impartiality in a case where the party and interest is a principal in a company the judge owns stock in,” said James Sample, a professor who specializes in judicial ethics at Hofstra University’s law school.
Others have questioned whether Musk’s legal team intentionally aimed to take their cases to O’Connor’s court — something known as “forum shopping” — in hopes of a sympathetic outcome.
The practice is controversial, but not illegal. Federal rules dictating where a lawsuit can be filed are broad, said Jennifer Ahearn, senior counsel for the Brennan Center’s Judiciary Program.
“They’re taking advantage of those openings in a way that is not common,” Ahearn said. “A reason why you don’t see that more is because you often don’t find both judges willing to accept these kinds of situations and parties willing to accept the wrath of the judges for doing that.”
But this judge, according to Ahearn, appears to be the opposite: willing to take on cases in his Texas district that would not ordinarily land there.
O’Connor, a member of the influential conservative legal group the Federalist Society, was appointed by former President George W. Bush in 2007. He has developed a reputation for handing down legal victories to Republicans, notably ruling against the Affordable Care Act and striking down federal gun regulations.
Now, O’Connor has taken on two cases from another conservative, who happens to be the richest person in the world who is using O’Connor’s court to attack perceived enemies.
O’Connor did not return multiple requests for comment. Musk did not, either.
Musk’s suit is draining Media Matters of cash
O’Connor is now in charge of two of Musk’s most high-profile legal crusades.
One of the cases, filed this week by Musk’s X, claims a consortium of advertisers that yanked ads from the platform illegally conspired against the social media site.
The repercussions of the case were almost instantaneous.
Fearing that the lawsuit would drain its finances, the World Federation of Advertisers said on Friday it would dissolve its brand safety initiative, known as the Global Alliance for Responsible Media.
Brands Unilever, Mars, CVS and Orsted are also named as defendants.
The second lawsuit was filed in November by Musk’s X, claiming liberal watchdog group Media Matters released a deceptive report about major advertisers appearing alongside pro-Nazi posts. The suit cited contract violations and business disparagement, a legal term for derogatory statements that harm a company.
The cost of turning over vast numbers of documents in the case, a process known as discovery, has already cost the nonprofit of about 100 people millions of dollars and forced it to lay off about 14 staffers.
Lawyers for Media Matters wrote in an email to Musk’s legal team that the document production has so far been “expansive and intrusive,” comparing the effort to “harassment,” according to legal filings, which show Musk’s legal team requesting the personal bank records of rank-and-file employees.
Five months ago, lawyers for Media Matters asked O’Connor to rule on what is often the first major hurdle of a lawsuit: a motion to dismiss determining whether Musk’s suit has any merit or not.
O’Connor green-lit the discovery process, but he still has not ruled on the lawsuit’s merits.
Allegations of “forum shopping” lodged at Musk
Like with the Media Matters case, neither X, which is listed in the suits as a Nevada corporation, nor any of the defendants are based in Texas.
But Musk’s legal team justified filing the Media Matters case in Texas by saying the nonprofit “routinely contacts” Texans asking them to subscribe to the group’s content and that, in the second case, the advertisers have a “substantial volume of business” in Texas.
Forum shopping accusations have recently come under scrutiny in the northern district of Texas, in part because the district is distinct.
In most parts of the country, lawsuits are randomly assigned to judges. But in northern Texas, judges take on suits based on which division of the district they are filed in. That can allow parties to almost cherry-pick a judge, according to Ahearn with the Brennan Center for Justice.
“It’s particularly extreme,” Ahearn said of forum shopping in northern Texas. “It has become a problem for the judiciary in a way that it hasn’t been in the past.”
Something else that makes the cases in Texas unique is that laws that protect people and groups from meritless lawsuits do not apply in Texas’ federal courts, under a 2019 appeals court decision. That effectively means that if Musk loses the cases, he will not have to pay the defendants’ legal fees, as he would in many states.
Records say Judge O’Connor is a Tesla investor
Another issue has raised concern among legal ethics experts: O’Connor appears to be an investor in Tesla, another company owned by Musk.
It is unclear whether O’Connor has sold his investment of up to $50,000 in Tesla stock, because the judge’s disclosure form covering the 2023 calendar year is not publicly available. He has requested a filing extension, according to an official with the administrative office of U.S. courts who was not authorized to speak on the record.
In May, an NPR investigation found that disclosure forms for judges are often missing, or late, for various reasons. As a result, potential conflicts of interest, like stock holdings or even gifts of luxury travel, are hidden from public view.
Media Matters lawyers have seized on O’Connor’s disclosure, saying rulings on what evidence the judge allows in the case could impact Tesla’s stock price. They argue that testimony or documents revealing Musk’s decision-making process could be made public.
“Such evidence has the potential to directly harm investor confidence in Musk — and thereby drive down Tesla’s share price. This is not speculation: History has shown that when Musk speaks, Tesla’s stock price responds,” Media Matters lawyer Andrew LeGrand wrote in a June filing.
Josh Blackman, an adjunct scholar at the right-leaning Cato Institute, had a different view, saying the case before O’Connor involves X, not Tesla.
“If the judge owned stock in X, if it were a public company, it’s an easy case,” Blackman said. “It’s a novel case because it requires a chain of inferences to get from X to Tesla.”
But judicial ethics scholar Sample insists the appearance of bias alone is enough to warrant O’Connor to step aside from the case.
He said: “Let another competent judge handle these cases without serious questions surrounding them.”
One observer of the current Senate race in Louisiana noted that Sen. Bill Cassidy could lose his reelection bid.
Annie Flanagan for NPR
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Annie Flanagan for NPR
Sen. Bill Cassidy lost Saturday’s Louisiana Republican primary according to a race call by the Associated Press.
Cassidy, who served two terms in the Senate, was one of seven Republican senators who voted to convict President Trump after the January 6th insurrection at the Capitol. That vote put him at odds with Trump and his MAGA coalition, ultimately leading Trump to push Rep. Julia Letlow to run against Cassidy.
Cassidy’s bid for a third term was viewed as a test of Trump’s grip on the party–and of what voters want from their representatives in Washington. The primary pitted Cassidy, a veteran lawmaker, former physician and chair of the powerful Senate health committee, against Letlow, a political newcomer and a millennial MAGA loyalist.
A detailed view of a hat that reads, Run Julia Run, is seen at a campaign event for Rep. Julia Letlow (R-LA) on May 6, 2026 in Franklinton, Louisiana.
Tyler Kaufman/Getty Images
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Tyler Kaufman/Getty Images
A former college administrator, Letlow won a special election in 2021 for the House seat her late husband, Luke, was set to assume before he died from COVID in 2020.
In Congress, Letlow sponsored a bill to collect oral histories from the pandemic and has focused on education and children. She introduced the “Parents Bill of Rights Act,” which would allow parents to review classroom materials like library books and require schools to notify parents if their child requests different pronouns, locker rooms or sports teams.
She also serves on the powerful appropriations committee and has embraced Trump’s agenda.
Letlow, who came first in Saturday’s primary, will face Louisiana state Treasurer John Fleming in the runoff on June 27. Cassidy came in third.
The election result is a victory for President Trump who has put Republican loyalty to the test on the ballot so far this year in Indiana state senate primaries and in Cassidy’s race.
Another major test of Trump’s influence comes in Kentucky’s primary on Tuesday when Republican Rep. Thomas Massie, who has found himself at odds with the president, faces a challenger endorsed by Trump.
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Brass bands in Beijing make way for sticker shock at home as Trump returns to escalating inflation
WASHINGTON (AP) — President Donald Trump returned from the spectacle of a Chinese state visit to a less than welcoming U.S. economy — with the military band and garden tour in Beijing giving way to pressure over how to fix America’s escalating inflation rate.
Consumer inflation in the United States increased to 3.8% annually in April, higher than what he inherited as the Iran war and the Republican president’s own tariffs have pushed up prices. Inflation is now outpacing wage gains and effectively making workers poorer. The Cleveland Federal Reserve estimates that annual inflation could reach 4.2% in May as the war has kept oil and gasoline prices high.
Trump’s time with Chinese leader Xi Jinping appears unlikely to help the U.S. economy much, despite Trump’s claims of coming trade deals. The trip occurred as many people are voting in primaries leading into the November general election while having to absorb the rising costs of gasoline, groceries, utility bills, jewelry, women’s clothing, airplane tickets and delivery services. Democrats see the moment as a political opportunity.
“He’s returning to a dumpster fire,” said Lindsay Owens, executive director of Groundwork Collaborative, a liberal think tank focused on economic issues. “The president will not have the faith and confidence of the American people — the economy is their top issue and the president is saying, ‘You’re on your own.’”
The president’s trip to Beijing and his recent comments that indicated a tone-deafness to voters’ concerns about rising prices have suggested his focus is not on the American public and have undermined Republicans who had intended to campaign on last year’s tax cuts as helping families.
Trump described the trip as a victory, saying on social media that Xi “congratulated me on so many tremendous successes,” as the U.S. president has praised their relationship.
Trump told reporters that Boeing would be selling 200 aircraft — and maybe even 750 “if they do a good job” — to the Chinese. He said American farmers would be “very happy” because China would be “buying billions of dollars of soybeans.”
“We had an amazing time,” Trump said as he flew home on Air Force One, and told Fox News’ Bret Baier in an interview that gasoline prices were just some “short-term pain” and would “drop like a rock” once the war ends.
Inflationary pain is not a factor in how Trump handles Iran
Trump departed from the White House for China by saying the negotiations over the Iran war depended on stopping Tehran from developing nuclear weapons. “I don’t think about Americans’ financial situation. I don’t think about anybody. I think about one thing: We cannot let Iran have a nuclear weapon,” Trump said.
That remark prompted blowback because it suggested to some that Trump cared more about challenging Iran than fighting inflation at home. Trump defended his words, telling Fox News: “That’s a perfect statement. I’d make it again.”
The White House has since stressed that Trump is focused on inflation.
Asked later about the president’s words, Vice President JD Vance said there had been a “misrepresentation” of the remarks. White House spokesman Kush Desai said the “administration remains laser-focused on delivering growth and affordability on the homefront” while indicating actions would be taken on grocery prices.
But as Trump appeared alongside Xi, new reports back home showed inflation rising for businesses and interest rates climbing on U.S. government debt.
His comments that Boeing would sell 200 jets to China caused the company’s stock price to fall because investors had expected a larger number. There was little concrete information offered about any trade agreements reached during the summit, including Chinese purchases of U.S. exports such as liquefied natural gas and beef.
“Foreign policy wins can matter politically, but only if voters feel stability and affordability in their daily lives,” said Brittany Martinez, a former Republican congressional aide who is the executive director of Principles First, a center-right advocacy group focused on democracy issues.
“Midterms are almost always a referendum on cost of living and public frustration, and Republicans are not immune from the same inflation and affordability pressures that hurt Democrats in recent cycles,” she added.
Democrats see Trump as vulnerable
Democratic lawmakers are seizing on Trump’s comments before his trip as proof of his indifference to lowering costs. There is potential staying power of his remarks as Americans head into Memorial Day weekend facing rising prices for the hamburgers and hot dogs to be grilled.
“What Americans do not see is any sympathy, any support, or any plan from Trump and congressional Republicans to lower costs – in fact, they see the opposite,” Senate Democratic leader Chuck Schumer of New York said Thursday.
Vance faulted the Biden administration for the inflation problem even though the inflation rate is now higher than it was when Trump returned to the White House in January 2025 with a specific mandate to fix it.
“The inflation number last month was not great,” Vance said Wednesday, but he then stressed, “We’re not seeing anything like what we saw under the Biden administration.”
Inflation peaked at 9.1% in June 2022 under Biden, a Democrat. By the time Trump took the oath of office, it was a far more modest 3%.
Trump’s inflation challenge could get harder
The data tells a different story as higher inflation is spreading into the cost of servicing the national debt.
Over the past week, the interest rate charged on 10-year U.S. government debt jumped from 4.36% to 4.6%, an increase that implies higher costs for auto loans and mortgages.
“My fear is that the layers of supply shocks that are affecting the U.S. economy will only further feed into inflationary pressures,” said Gregory Daco, chief economist at EY-Parthenon.
Daco noted that last year’s tariff increases were now translating into higher clothing prices. With the Supreme Court ruling against Trump’s ability to impose tariffs by declaring an economic emergency, his administration is preparing a new set of import taxes for this summer.
Daco stressed that there have been a series of supply shocks. First, tariffs cut into the supply of imports. In addition, Trump’s immigration crackdown cut into the supply of foreign-born workers. Now, the effective closure of the Strait of Hormuz has cut off the vital waterway used to ship 20% of global oil supplies.
“We’re seeing an erosion of growth,” Daco said.
Dr. Tracy Beth Hoeg, the Food and Drug Administration’s top drug regulator, said she was fired from the agency Friday after she declined to resign.
She said she did not know who had ordered her firing or why, nor whether Health Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. knew of her fate. The Department of Health and Human Services did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
The departure reflected the upheaval at the F.D.A., days after the resignation of Dr. Marty Makary, the agency commissioner. Dr. Makary had become a lightning rod for critics of the agency’s decisions to reject applications for rare disease drugs and to delay a report meant to supply damaging evidence about the abortion drug mifepristone. He also spent months before his departure pushing back on the White House’s requests for him to approve more flavored vapes, the reason he ultimately cited for leaving.
Dr. Hoeg’s hiring had startled public health leaders who were familiar with her track record as a vaccine skeptic, and she played a leading role in some of the agency’s most divisive efforts during her tenure. She worked on a report that purportedly linked the deaths of children and young adults to Covid vaccines, a dossier the agency has not released publicly. She was also the co-author of a document describing Mr. Kennedy’s decision to pare the recommendations for 17 childhood vaccines down to 11.
But in an interview on Friday, Dr. Hoeg said she “stuck with the science.”
“I am incredibly proud of the work we were doing,” Dr. Hoeg said, adding, “I’m glad that we didn’t give in to any pressures to approve drugs when it wasn’t appropriate.”
As the director of the agency’s Center for Drug Evaluation and Research, she was a political appointee in a role that had been previously occupied by career officials. An epidemiologist who was trained in the United States and Denmark, she worked on efforts to analyze drug safety and on a panel to discuss the use of serotonin reuptake inhibitors, the most widely prescribed class of antidepressants, during pregnancy. She also worked on efforts to reduce animal testing and was the agency’s liaison to an influential vaccine committee.
She made sure that her teams approved drugs only when the risk-benefit balance was favorable, she said.
The firing worsens the leadership vacuum at the F.D.A. and other agencies, with temporary leaders filling the role of commissioner, food chief and the head of the biologics center, which oversees vaccines and gene therapies. The roles of surgeon general and director of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention are also unfilled.
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