Musk Deposition Sought by Ex-Twitter Worker in Mass Layoff Suit

A former Twitter Inc. employee asked a federal judge to order Elon Musk to sit for a seven-hour deposition to answer questions about his role in a mass layoff at the social media platform now known as X.

Musk has “first-hand, non-redundant, knowledge of the relevant facts” at the heart of several suits alleging violations of the federal Worker Adjustment and Retraining Notification, or WARN, Act and state variations, according to a discovery letter one laid-off employee filed Wednesday in the US District Court for the Northern District of California.

An attorney for Twitter—now part of Musk’s X Corp., which is also named as a defendant here—didn’t immediately respond to a Thursday request for comment. Musk isn’t a defendant in this suit, although other workers have brought their own claims against him.

The entrepreneur,, who stepped down as Twitter’s CEO in June 2023 but remained as chief technology officer, began a wave of layoffs when he took over the company in 2022. Workers have since filed multiple actions accusing Twitter of violating state and federal laws on the amount of notice required before certain mass firings and laws prohibiting discrimination on the basis of age, sex, and disability.

The law firm Lichten & Liss-Riordan PC filed more than 10 of the employment cases against Twitter, including this one, and nearly 2,000 individual arbitration actions related to the layoffs. The parties already agreed that discovery produced in one of the firm’s Twitter cases can be used in others, and agreed to a consolidated deposition instead of making Musk appear multiple times for questioning.

However, Lichten & Liss-Riordan reserved the right to seek a second deposition on a good-cause showing, because Twitter has “repeatedly produced relevant documents from witnesses on the day before, the day of, or even after their respective depositions,” according to the letter from Shannon Liss-Riordan, one of the firm’s founders.

Evidence already produced shows Musk had first-hand knowledge about the facts of this and other cases, the letter said. He was “personally responsible” for setting Twitter policies and strategies after he bought the company, and “was adamant about cutting costs and massively reducing the size of Twitter’s workforce.”

Eitan Adler, the worker who filed this proposed class WARN Act case, has “exhausted less intrusive discovery methods,” according to the letter. He already deposed three of four other senior executives Twitter said had knowledge of the layoffs.

But the executives couldn’t answer questions about Musk’s pre-acquisition layoff plans or the intended size or scope of any planned layoffs, the letter said. They also lacked information on “who made the ultimate decision on which employees to terminate or how the final determination was made.”

Morgan, Lewis & Bockius LLP represents Twitter.

The case is Adler v. Twitter Inc., N.D. Cal., No. 3:23-cv-01788, discovery letter filed 3/13/24.