Has anyone else ever noticed Elon Musk is a little weird about women – especially ones he has hired? A few of the best examples of this are a former SpaceX intern turned employee the multi-company CEO had a years-long on-again-off-again relationship with dating back to 2017 and his penchant for having babies with coworkers. In a new story from the Wall Street Journal, we get an inside look at just what sort of weird shit Musk has been up to with the women who work for him. It is not a pleasant read, but it is an important one nonetheless.
These gross acts have led to former SpaceX executives and fired employees complaining to the National Labor Relations Board in 2022 that a high-level group around Musk has failed to apply the company’s own rules to its CEOs, and that has led to a culture of sexism and harassment.
Here’s more on Musk’s alleged relationship with a fresh-out-of-college subordinate that went on for years, from WSJ:
She’d approached him with ideas for improving SpaceX. Her outreach had led to a date, which led to a kiss, and eventually sex, she told friends. The year after her internship, the billionaire had the fresh college graduate flown out to a resort in Sicily, before they ended things, according to documents reviewed by The Wall Street Journal.
Musk, who is more than 20 years her senior, attempted to restart their relationship but she rejected his advance. They remained close as she tried to establish herself in the new job.
He texted her often and invited her to come over to his Los Angeles mansion at night on multiple occasions. Sometimes she accepted his invitations, but friends said she told them at the time that his behavior made her job harder.
She eventually moved off Musk’s executive team, according to friends she told and to people familiar with her time at SpaceX. The woman left the company in 2019.
Her lawyers, who also represent Musk, provided the Journal with two affidavits signed by the woman. The affidavits disputed some aspects of the Journal’s reporting but confirmed many others, including that she had a romantic relationship with Musk in the past. She said she invited him to dinner near the end of her summer internship and broke things off the following year.
She said at no point during employment at SpaceX from 2017 to 2019 was there any “romantic relationship” with Musk.
“Nothing that Elon Musk did towards me during either of my periods of employment at SpaceX was predatory or wrongful in any way,” the woman said.
However, she is just one of several women employed at SpaceX who have told people close to them that Musk showed them a weird amount of attention or pursued them. Musk apparently has even gone so far as to pretty much bribe these women into having sex with him – something that is both morally reprehensible and plain old gross. There’s one woman – a SpaceX flight attended – who alleged that in 2016 Musk exposed himself to her and offered to buy her a horse in exchange for sex acts.
Another woman who left the company in 2013 alleged in exit negotiations with SpaceX human resources and legal executives that Musk had asked her to have his babies.
A fourth woman had a month-long sexual relationship with Musk in 2014 while she directly reported to him. The relationship ended badly, leading to recriminations over text and email as she left the company and signed an agreement prohibiting her from discussing her work for Musk.
Here’s why many of these complaints have fallen on the deaf ears of higher-ups at SpaceX, according to WSJ:
They say there’s an understanding that Musk, a charismatic leader with many fans who call him a genius, can act with impunity. “Elon is SpaceX, and SpaceX is Elon,” one former engineer recalled an executive saying during a June 2022 meeting after the firings of some of the SpaceX employees, who had criticized Musk and demanded greater accountability at the company.
You will not be shocked to learn that executives at SpaceX have vehemently denied these claims. Gwynne Shotwell, president and COO of SpaceX, told the Journal that its reporting absolutely doesn’t reflect the aerospace company’s culture.
“The untruths, mischaracterizations, and revisionist history in your email paint a completely misleading narrative,” she said. “I continue to be amazed by what this extraordinary group of people are achieving every day even amidst all the forces acting against us. And Elon is one of the best humans I know.”
She said SpaceX fully investigates all complaints of harassment and takes appropriate actions.
Actually, before I send you over there, I just want to share some of the text conversations he had with one woman. Despite the fact Musk is a fully grown adult billionaire, he texts like a teenager who just discovered what a penis does.
Come by!” he wrote. When she didn’t respond, he peppered her with more texts:
“Look, it’s either me or 6am [exercise] :)”
“Just finished the Model 3 production call. It’s def going to be hell for several more months.”
“Are you coming over? If not, I will probably tranq out. Too stressed to sleep naturally.”
When she still hadn’t responded, he wrote, “Probably best if we don’t see each other.”
The woman texted him in the morning. “Oh man. I’m sorry, I’d already fallen asleep. I’ve been a late night person most of my life but have been trying to switch over because it seems responsible. Tbh. Sorry I crashed last night,” she wrote.
What a weirdo. OK, now you should go read the Journal’s story.