Lawyers for Elon Musk and Tesla filed a motion demanding that Delaware Judge Kathaleen McCormick step aside from all cases involving their client after discovering that her account "liked" a LinkedIn post celebrating Musk's recent legal defeat in California.

The post in question came from a jury consultant who worked against Musk in a federal case last week, where a jury found that Musk had defrauded Twitter investors. The consultant's post did not mince words:

"Sorry, Elon. Sorry, Quinn Emanuel. Thanks $2 billion for your help in this trial. It was a pleasure working against you."

According to Hot Air, Judge McCormick's account hit "Support" on that post. Her account also reportedly liked another message stating that "so many people who should be so deeply ashamed of themselves seem incapable of being so." Musk's attorneys described these interactions in their filing as "inflammatory" and "not simply negative criticism."

McCormick responded in a letter to attorneys with a statement that reads more like a riddle than a denial:

"I either did not click the 'support' icon at all, or I did so accidentally. I do not believe that I did it accidentally."

Read that again. She either didn't do it or she did it by accident, but she doesn't think she did it by accident. That leaves one logical possibility she conspicuously failed to address.

The Pay Package Saga

This is not the first time McCormick's handling of Musk-related cases has raised eyebrows. The judge overturned Musk's multi-billion-dollar pay package at Tesla back in January 2024, a ruling that originated from a lawsuit brought by a shareholder who held nine shares of stock.

Musk responded by announcing a new shareholder vote on the same pay package. A few months later, 75% of shareholders approved it. The message from Tesla's actual owners was unambiguous.

McCormick decided it didn't matter. The factual record in the case was already closed, she ruled, and the vote came too late to count. Her reasoning, laid out in court filings, is worth reading in full:

"Defendants raised the Stockholder Vote defense six years after this action was filed, one and a half years after trial, and five months after the Post-Trial Opinion. Wherever the outer boundary of non-prejudicial delay lies, Defendants crossed it."

Procedurally, judges do have discretion over late-raised defenses. But the effect was striking: a single-digit shareholder's complaint outweighed the expressed will of three-quarters of Tesla's ownership. Musk replied to the situation more than 15 months ago with two words: "Absolute corruption."

A Basic Eeenet of Due Process

Andrew Stoltmann, a Chicago-based attorney and adjunct professor at Northwestern University, said the LinkedIn activity cuts to the core of judicial neutrality:

"This judge violated that basic tenet of due process. The judge should absolutely be off this case."

The standard for judicial recusal is not whether a judge actually harbors bias. It is whether a reasonable person, knowing all the circumstances, would question the judge's impartiality. Clicking "Support" on a post gloating over a litigant's courtroom loss clears that bar by a comfortable margin.

Judges are not expected to live in hermetically sealed chambers. They can have opinions. But there is a difference between privately holding views and publicly endorsing content that mocks a party whose cases you are actively overseeing. One is human nature. The other is a problem.

The Broader Pattern

What makes this particularly corrosive is the sequence. A judge overturns a billionaire's pay package. The company's shareholders vote overwhelmingly to reinstate it. The judge says the vote is irrelevant. The billionaire calls the process corrupt. And then the judge's social media account surfaces, cheering his defeat in an unrelated case in another state.

Each individual fact might be explainable in isolation. Taken together, they sketch the outline of something the legal system cannot afford: a judge who appears to have a rooting interest.

Musk is now potentially on the hook for billions in damages from the California case. The Delaware cases involving Tesla carry their own enormous financial stakes. The judge presiding over those cases does not get the luxury of ambiguous LinkedIn activity and self-contradicting explanations.

What Comes Next

McCormick has not yet formally ruled on whether she will recuse herself. Her letter to attorneys, with its circular non-denial, suggests she may try to hold her position. If she does, expect Musk's team to escalate.

The legal system runs on trust. Not trust that every judge is perfectly objective, because no human being is, but trust that judges will at least avoid the appearance of partiality. That appearance is now shattered. No letter to counsel can reassemble it.

Judges who want to keep their cases should keep their thumbs off the "Support" button.