Musk’s X Taps Morgan Lewis to Handle Twitter Execs’ Pay Suit

Another day, another lawsuit for Elon Musk’s litigators at Morgan, Lewis & Bockius, which has emerged as a key defender of his business interests.

The technology titan’s X Corp. has once again turned to the law firm for outside counsel, this time in a lawsuit filed last week by four former executives seeking $128 million in severance pay after Musk terminated them upon his purchase of the social media platform formerly known as Twitter Inc.

Those individuals—all represented by Sidley Austin—include Twitter’s former chief legal and policy officer Vijaya Gadde and ex-general counsel Sean Edgett, as well as Parag Agrawal and Ned Segal, who respectively were the company’s former chief executive officer and chief financial officer. All were fired by Musk in late 2022 after he closed his $44 billion acquisition of Twitter.

The executives allege they were singled out for “special ire” by Musk, claiming he withheld severance payments to them as punishment for representing the San Francisco-based company’s interests. Agrawal is seeking about $57 million in pay, Segal some $44 million, Gadde roughly $20 million, and Edgett another $6.7 million, according to their complaint.

Eric Meckley, an employment litigation partner at Morgan Lewis in San Francisco, filed an appearance Monday for X in the case, which will be assigned to a new federal district judge in the city.

Morgan Lewis, Meckley, and X didn’t respond to requests for comment about their relationship with Musk, which extends to a constellation of other companies that are part of the billionaire’s so-called Muskonomy.

Second Showdown

Morgan Lewis and Sidley have faced one another before in court over money that Musk has allegedly sought to deny the former Twitter executives, who served as his adversaries during the company’s months-long takeover battle.

A Delaware court awarded $1.1 million in October to Agrawal, Gadde, and other Twitter executives for legal fees they incurred on behalf of the company addressing government-related inquiries. Musk and what is now X initially paid $600,000 for their legal tab—but then withheld further payments to their outside counsel. Sidley advised Gadde during her congressional testimony last year with two other former Twitter executives.

Morgan Lewis advised Musk and X in that Delaware dispute with Gadde and others. Within the past year, the firm has had a role in 35% of cases involving Twitter and X in US federal courts, according to Bloomberg Law data.

Tesla Inc., the Musk-controlled electric vehicle giant, has also turned to Morgan Lewis to handle more than 30% of its matters in federal courts over the last year, per Bloomberg Law data. Morgan Lewis has appeared in 26% of federal court cases within the past five years involving Space Exploration Technologies Corp., Musk’s privately held rocketry company. The underlying cases in which Morgan Lewis is involved are a mix of employment, fraud, patent, and contract disputes.

At X, Musk has pledged to pick up the legal tab for some users of its social media platform that claim they suffered for posts made to it. Musk’s X has also recently sought to restock an in-house law department decimated by layoffs and exits.

Gadde, Twitter’s longtime top lawyer, earned nearly $17 million in total compensation during her last year at the company.

The severance pay case is Agrawal v. Musk, N.D. Cal., No. 24-cv-01304.