Elon Musk’s Tesla Asked Law Firm to Fire Associate Hired from SEC | Hacker News Reader

Elon Musk’s Tesla Asked Law Firm to Fire Associate Hired from SEC

wsj.com

25 pointscamjohnson266 comments

This seems like a bombshell story. It's overtly corrupt, isn't it? The clear message is "if you're a line attorney at a regulator and take adverse action against any of my companies, I'll get you iced out of BigLaw". Just wildly unethical.

Probably not "overtly" in the sense that there's no written law against it; quite overtly in that Cooley's refusal was likely based on some specific line in its ethics handbook that said this was an improper request.

Elon has personal experience with this person, and when two private companies do business with each other, they get to ask certain things of each other, and shape the team providing them service. It's a totally voluntary thing. In this case the company refused, and lost business.

As for corruption, I think it comes down to whether this decision helps or hinders Tesla. Many view the crossover of private and public individuals as good because they bring expertise. Others view it as straight up corruption.

So is Elon creating the corruption, or fighting the corruption with this move? Maybe he thinks his lawyers were getting to friendly with the government agencies and had a perverse incentive to just collect money from Tesla without pushing the envelope.

Elon/Tesla is within their right to ask the Law firm to not have a particular attorney represent them or work on their business.

Elon/Tesla is NOT within their rights to ask the Law firm to fire one of their employees just because he doesn't like that lawyer. This is just Elon being an asshole and exerting his power as the CEO of a big client of the Law firm, perhaps one of their most important clients.

But on the other hand it is not surprising, Elon has again and again shown what kind of a person he is, an extremely smart, but morally very corrupt person.

The corruption isn't about hurting or helping Tesla.

It's about Musk using his personal power and influence over Tesla to deter (the employees of) regulatory agencies from investigating him like any other citizen.

Musk is creating the corruption with this move, obviously.

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