Elon Musk was dating Amber Heard and finalizing a divorce around the time he's said to have sexually harassed a SpaceX flight attendant
- A SpaceX flight attendant accused Elon Musk of exposing himself and propositioning her in late 2016.
- At about that time, he was divorcing Talulah Riley and dating Amber Heard.
Elon Musk was finalizing a divorce, dating the actor Amber Heard, and developing The Boring Company at about the time he was said to have exposed himself and sexually propositioned a SpaceX flight attendant.
An Insider investigation published Thursday found that the flight attendant accused Musk of exposing his erect penis, touching her leg, and offering to give her a horse in exchange for a sexual favor in late 2016. Documents and interviews procured by Insider indicate she declined the proposition.
At the time, Musk was in the middle of divorce proceedings with the actor Talulah Riley. It was their second split: Musk announced their divorce in 2012, the couple remarried in 2013, and Musk again filed for divorce from Riley in December 2014 before withdrawing the paperwork seven months later. In 2016, their relationship ended for good, with their divorce finalized that October.
That year Musk was also rumored to be dating Heard, whom he met and bonded with at the Met Gala in May 2016.
More details about Musk and Heard's yearlong relationship recently emerged during Heard's high-profile defamation trial against her ex-husband, Johnny Depp. Heard's therapist testified that Heard "felt nothing" and that her "soul was dead" when she started dating Musk several weeks after splitting with Depp.
In October 2016, Musk also announced that Tesla was planning to develop solar roofs. A month later, Tesla closed on its acquisition of Musk's cousins' company, SolarCity — a landmark deal that later landed Musk in a $2 billion lawsuit from Tesla's shareholders, which he won in April of this year.
And in December 2016, Musk came up with the idea of The Boring Company. He tweeted on December 17 that year: "Traffic is driving me nuts. Am going to build a tunnel boring machine and just start digging..."
"It shall be called 'The Boring Company,'" Musk tweeted.
According to Insider's investigation, SpaceX in 2018 paid the flight attendant a $250,000 severance agreement in exchange for a promise not to sue over the claims or discuss the payment, Musk, or his businesses.
Musk told Insider there was "a lot more to this story" and, after the article's publication, called the accusations "utterly untrue." He also called the story "politically motivated hit piece."