Elon Musk,CEO & Founder, SpaceX
The attendant alleged that Billionaire Elon Musk exposed himself and propositioned her during a flight in a private room on the plane, according to the friend, the report said. Musk offered to buy the attendant a horse in exchange for an for an erotic massage
Musk took to Twitter late on Thursday to denounce as “utterly untrue” claims in a news report that he had sexually harassed a flight attendant on a private jet in 2016
SpaceX paid an employee $250,000 to settle a claim she was sexually harassed by Elon Musk in 2016, according to a report from Insider.
The closely held rocket launch company, of which Musk is founder and chief executive officer, made the payment in 2018 to an unidentified flight attendant who worked as a contract employee on a SpaceX corporate jet, the online news provider said, citing interviews and documents, including a declaration signed by a friend of the attendant and made in support of her claim.
Representatives for Hawthorne, California-based Space Exploration Technologies Corp. did not immediately reply to a request for comment. Musk did not respond to an email seeking comment. Alex Spiro, who serves as Musk’s outside counsel, did not respond to a text message.
The attendant alleged that Musk exposed himself and propositioned her during a flight in a private room on the plane, according to the friend, the report said. Musk offered to buy the attendant a horse in exchange for an erotic massage, it said.
In addition to allegedly exposing himself, Musk rubbed the flight attendant’s thigh , Business Insider quoted the friend of the flight attendant as saying.
The flight attendant came to believe that her refusal to accept Musk’s proposal had hurt her opportunities to work at SpaceX and prompted her to hire a lawyer in 2018, according to Business Insider.
The rocket company made the settlement out of court and included a nondisclosure agreement which prevented the flight attendant from speaking about it, Business Insider said. The news site did not name the friend or the flight attendant.
Meanwhile, billionaire Elon Musk took to Twitter late on Thursday to denounce as “utterly untrue” claims in a news report that he had sexually harassed a flight attendant on a private jet in 2016.
“I have a challenge to this liar who claims their friend saw me ‘exposed’ – describe just one thing, anything at all (scars, tattoos, …) that isn’t known by the public. She won’t be able to do so, because it never happened,” Musk tweeted.
Reuters was not able to verify the Business Insider account. Musk and SpaceX did not respond to Reuters requests for comment on the Business Insider story or on Musk’s tweets.
Musk, who is also chief executive of Tesla Inc and is in the midst of a contentious effort to buy Twitter Inc, said on Wednesday that he would vote Republican instead of Democrat, predicting a “dirty tricks campaign against me” would follow.
In the Business Insider article, Musk was quoted as saying the flight attendant’s story was a “politically motivated hit piece” and that there was “a lot more to this story.”
On Thursday evening, Musk first tweeted: “The attacks against me should be viewed through a political lens – this is their standard (despicable) playbook – but nothing will deter me from fighting for a good future and your right to free speech.” In the initial tweet, he did not specifically mention the allegations in the Business Insider article.
“And, for the record, those wild accusations are utterly untrue,” Musk added in another tweet.
He also tweeted that the article was meant to interfere with the Twitter acquisition.