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Elon Muskâs legal team has responded to Twitterâs lawsuit against him, saying that the company is demanding an unreasonably fast trial. In response, Muskâs team asks that the case not be heard until next year, according to Bloomberg.
Twitter has pushed for the trial to take place in mid-September, justifying the request to expedite things given that Musk and Twitterâs merger agreement has an October 24th âpresumptive drop-dead date.â However, Muskâs team is asking that the trial not be held until February 13th, 2023 trial at the earliest, Bloomberg reports.
Twitter declined to comment on the matter, and pointed to its initial complaint filed Tuesday.
Twitter sued Musk earlier this week after he officially tried to bail on his $44 billion agreement to buy the company. Nearly immediately after he said he intended to pull the plug, Twitter board chairman Bret Taylor said the company would be taking Musk to court, and the company filed its lawsuit on Tuesday. Musk hadnât responded via the court until Friday, though on Tuesday, he did tweet.
Muskâs primary assertion for wanting to terminate the merger is that Twitter has not given him the data to ââmake an independent assessment of the prevalence of fake or spam accounts on Twitterâs platform,â his legal team wrote last week. His team again invoked the bots issue in Fridayâs filing. According to The Wall Street Journal, they said that âthe core dispute over false and spam accounts is fundamental to Twitterâs value. It is also extremely fact and expert intensive, requiring substantial time for discovery.â
There will be a 90-minute hearing next week on July 19th at 11AM ET to decide when the trial will take place, according to Bloomberg and Reuters.