Elon Musk's use of illegal drugs alarms senior executives
Technology
They worry use of illegal drugs could impact business operations he oversees
(Web Desk) - Musk is known to take drugs like cocaine and LSD at private parties, according to the Wall Street Journal — habits that at SpaceX could run afoul of federal contracting rules.
Elon Musk’s public use of marijuana is hardly a secret. He smoked marijuana on commentator Joe Rogan’s podcast in September 2018.
But executives and board members in Musk’s companies have grown increasingly alarmed about his private drug use in recent years, according to a Wall Street Journal report on Saturday.
Senior executives worry that Musk's use of illegal drugs could impact the business operations of the six companies he oversees, including EV-maker Tesla, SpaceX and X, the former Twitter.
Citing sources close to Musk, the newspaper said the mercurial billionaire routinely uses hard drugs like LSD, cocaine, ecstasy and psychedelic mushrooms at private parties.
Guests at the events sign nondisclosure agreements and agree to give up their phones, it said.
Musk, age 52, has also publicly said that he uses ketamine — a psychedelic-like painkiller and anesthetic — to treat depression.
He took acid at party he hosted in Los Angeles in 2018, magic mushrooms one year later in Mexico and ketamine with his brother, Kimball Musk, at Art Basel in Miami in 2021, the news outlet reported.
The entrepreneur's other companies include tunneling concern The Boring Co., a brain implant startup called Neuralink and the xAI artificial intelligence startup.
With a net worth of more than $243 billion, according to Forbes, he's the world's richest person.
Some of the executives in the report were not named. But one, former Tesla director Linda Rice Johnson, decided not to seek re-election to the electric vehicle company’s board of directors in 2019 over concerns about Musk’s drug use.
The Journal added that SpaceX President Gwynne Shotwell stepped in for Musk when he was incomprehensible and slurring his words during a 2017 speech at an all-hands meeting.
SpaceX, where Musk is CEO and founder, has roughly $14 billion in U.S. government contracts for civilian and military space missions.
The executives are concerned that Musk's drug use could run afoul of federal laws requiring contractors to support a drug-free culture.
Tesla’s code of conduct forbids drug use, the newspaper reported.
Some executives worry that Musk was on drugs when he wrote a 2018 post on X, then called Twitter, about taking Tesla private for $420 a share — the number is slang in cannabis culture for pot consumption, the newspaper reported.
The post, which violated Securities and Exchange Commission rules, resulted in an investigation by the agency that forcedto step down as Tesla chairman.
While executives have raised concerns in private, they've kept silent at board meetings where their worries would be recorded, according to the Journal.
Some of them once approached Musk's brother Kimbal for help in approaching the billionaire about his behavior, but they didn't use the word "drugs," the newspaper said.
Musk’s attorney, Alex Spiro, did not reply to a request for comment from The Messenger on Sunday, but told the Journal that the billionaire is regularly and randomly tested for drugs and has never failed.
