By John Ikani
Elon Musk has rejected allegations that he groped and exposed himself to a flight attendant six years ago.
Musk tweeted late Thursday: “For the record, those wild accusations are utterly untrue.”
Hours earlier, a report in the ‘Business Insider’ claimed the billionaire allegedly “exposed his erect penis, rubbed the attendant’s leg without consent, and offered to buy her a horse in exchange for an erotic massage”. She was a cabin crew member at SpaceX’s fleet of private jets, the report said.
It cited a woman who said she was a friend of the flight attendant in question.
“The attacks against me should be viewed through a political lens – this is their standard (despicable) playbook,” Musk tweeted Thursday.
He did not specify who “their” referred to, but added: “I have a challenge to this liar who claims their friend saw me ‘exposed’ – describe just one thing, anything at all (scars, tattoos, …) that isn’t known by the public. She won’t be able to do so, because it never happened.”
The South Africa-born entrepreneur — who holds US, Canadian and South African citizenship — had earlier said he was switching his support from the US Democratic party to the Republicans.
“Now, watch their dirty tricks campaign against me unfold …” he added.
In December, a former SpaceX engineer said sexual harassment is rampant at the aerospace company, describing in an essay for Lioness how she made multiple complaints about the workplace without results. Ashley Kosak, former mission integration engineer at SpaceX, recounted being touched without consent, stared at, asked out and messaged on her personal Instagram account, adding that SpaceX is “so rife with sexism, the only remedy is for women to leave.”
The allegations come to light as Musk is pursuing a $44 billion deal to buy Twitter in an effort to loosen the platform’s content moderation, a change that would have outsized influence on politics and society.
