Elon Musk Says an OpenAI Whistleblower Was Murdered

In the early morning hours of Thursday, Tesla CEO Elon Musk claimed that an OpenAI whistleblower named Suchir Balaji, who passed away last year, was actually killed.

"He was murdered," Musk posted, in reference to Balaji's death.

The late 26-year-old software engineer had gone to the New York Times months before his passing, decrying what he deemed to be illegal copyright violations by his employer. He was also prepared to testify as a witness in the newspaper's lawsuit against the company.

As Fortune reports, Musk repeated the claim that he was murdered — despite investigators concluding earlier this year that he'd taken his own life with a gun  — hours after OpenAI CEO Sam Altman appeared on Tucker Carlson's show during which the same topic came up.

The implication, seemingly: that OpenAI, or those associated with it, secretly orchestrated the whistleblower's murder.

"I was really shaken by this tragedy," Altman told Carlson. "I spent a lot of time trying to, you know, read everything I could, as I'm sure you and others did too, about what happened."

"It looks like a suicide to me," he concluded.

It was a bizarre exchange, with a defensive Altman joking that "I haven’t done too many interviews where I’ve been accused of murder."

"You understand how this sounds like an accusation," Altman told Carlson, after he went on a tirade about the purported evidence supporting the theory that Balaji was murdered.

It's not hard to see Musk's motivation for trying to side with Carlson on the issue. His personal feud with Altman has been simmering for years, escalating into a full-blown and drawn-out legal battle.

Balaji's death quickly became a major point of contention earlier this year, with his family refusing to accept the investigator's findings. His mother made her own appearance on Carlson's show, arguing that the evidence didn't add up. She also filed a lawsuit against the San Francisco Police Department, demanding the release of the full report. As Fortune points out, the external investigator the family hired never visited the crime scene.

While Musk is unlikely to lend much additional credence to the theory that Balaji's death involved foul play, his significant influence and following could set the stage for an escalation.

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