Securities and Exchange Commission
Enforcement

Musk Wants to Stop his ‘Twitter Sitter’ Agreement

He tried once before and was denied, but Elon Musk has asked a federal appeals court in New York to throw out his 2018 agreement with US regulators requiring a Tesla Inc. lawyer to screen all his company-related Twitter posts, calling it an illegal limitation on his free-speech rights.

Musk, Tesla’s chief executive officer and now the owner of Twitter Inc., has claimed that the agreement with the US Securities and Exchange Commission violates the First Amendment to the Constitution and that the SEC is harassing him. 

The requirement “chills Mr. Musk’s speech,” limiting his ability to make statements about Tesla that don’t violate any securities laws, Ellyde R. Thompson, an attorney representing the Tesla CEO, told the panel.

Last year, US District Judge Lewis Liman refused to release Musk from the deal and end his “Twitter Sitter” requirement, saying the CEO was “simply bemoaning that he felt like he had to agree to it at the time” and now “wishes that he had not.” Liman also denied Musk’s effort to block an SEC subpoena seeking information on his tweets.

Full Article is at Fortune’s website.

Securities Attorney at Sallah Astarita & Cox | 212-509-6544 | mja@sallahlaw.com | Website | + posts

Mark Astarita is a nationally recognized securities attorney, who represents investors, financial professionals and firms in securities litigation, arbitration and regulatory matters, including SEC and FINRA investigations and enforcement proceedings.

He is a partner in the national securities law firm Sallah Astarita & Cox, LLC, and the founder of The Securities Law Home Page - SECLaw.com, which was one of the first legal topic sites on the Internet. It went online in 1995 and is updated daily with news, commentary and securities law related links.

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