Elon Musk’s Lawyer At Tesla Quits – Probably Wise Really

It can be amusing what stories just turn up in the feed. At times the conjunction of them can be all too apposite:

[perfectpullquote align=”full” bordertop=”false” cite=”” link=”” color=”” class=”” size=””]Tesla’s general counsel leaves the company after two months[/perfectpullquote]

That might actually be a wise decision:

[perfectpullquote align=”full” bordertop=”false” cite=”” link=”” color=”” class=”” size=””] Tesla’s general counsel is leaving the company after just two months on the job — the latest in a series of executive departures at Elon Musk’s electric car company. Dane Butswinkas, who joined Tesla (TSLA) in December, will return to his legal practice at Williams & Connolly in Washington, the company said in a statement Wednesday.
“I’m grateful for the opportunity over the past seven months to have worked with both Elon and Tesla, first as outside counsel and most recently as General Counsel at Tesla,” Butswinkas said in a statement. “I look forward to continuing my work with Tesla in an outside counsel role.” [/perfectpullquote]

The reason why that might be wise is this:

That’s the sort of thing Elon’s promised the SEC he’s not going to do. And it’s his lawyer who is supposed to stop him:

[perfectpullquote align=”full” bordertop=”false” cite=”” link=”” color=”” class=”” size=””] The posts seem unoffensive by Musk’s standards, given his penchant for inflammatory tweets. But the incident raises questions about the effectiveness of an SEC fraud settlement and attempts to rein in Musk’s online antics. As part of the company’s settlement with the SEC in September — which stemmed from a now-infamous Musk tweet about taking the company private — Tesla was supposed to create a system for monitoring Musk’s statements to the public about the company, whether on Twitter, blog posts or any other medium. [/perfectpullquote]

Yeah, a small reconsideration of career choices and paths doesn’t sound all that bad an idea.