Twitter slammed Elon Musk’s third attempt at terminating his acquisition deal, arguing it was invalid and irrelevant to Musk’s real motives for trying to terminate his purchase of the social media platform.
Musk had claimed Friday that Twitter’s severance pay to whistleblower Peiter Zatko was proof that it had violated a clause within the agreement for his purchase of the company. But the social media company said in a Monday filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission that Musk’s complaint is not a valid justification for ending the $44 billion takeover agreement. The letter is the latest exchange of legal jabs between the two parties over Musk’s attempts to get out of his agreement to buy the company.
“As was the case with each of your prior purported terminations, the Musk Parties’ third purported termination is invalid for the independent reason that Mr. Musk and the other Musk Parties continue to knowingly, intentionally, willfully, and materially breach the Agreement,” Twitter said in its filing.
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Zatko’s revelations made news in August when he unveiled details about Twitter’s poor security practices. He also spoke on the company’s approach to bots, alleging that the company had been deceptive through its use of the “monetizable daily active users” metric, which fits a much stricter category of spam accounts than what Musk has pursued in his attempts to justify ending the deal.
Twitter agreed to pay Zatko a $7.75 million settlement days before he filed his original whistleblower complaint against the company, according to the Wall Street Journal. The settlement included agreeing to a nondisclosure agreement forbidding him from speaking publicly about his time at Twitter.
Zatko is scheduled to appear before Congress on Tuesday to speak on the allegations of his whistleblower report. The former hacker, known as “Mudge,” was also subpoenaed by Musk’s legal team for documents related to his claims. He was also referenced in Musk’s second attempt to terminate his deal with Twitter on Aug. 30.
The number of bot accounts on Twitter has been a constant source of contention between the social media giant and Musk, who pulled out of his merger over allegations of inaccurate estimates of spam bots.
Twitter’s and Musk’s legal teams are scheduled to meet from Oct. 17-21 for an expedited trial over Twitter’s lawsuit about Musk’s termination of the deal. The two parties have filed multiple subpoenas seeking information regarding Twitter’s practices and Musk’s finances. Twitter filed multiple subpoenas to Musk’s compatriots for documentation discussing the funding of Musk’s planned $44 billion acquisition of the company. Musk himself filed a subpoena against former Twitter CEO Jack Dorsey while seeking information about his time at the company.
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Musk attempted to delay the trial by a month, only for the judge overseeing the trial in the Delaware Court of Chancery to reject the request over allegations that an excess delay could cause irreparable harm to Twitter as a company.
