Tesla CEO and X owner Elon Musk, who supports Republican presidential nominee former U.S. President Donald Trump, gestures as he speaks about voting during an America PAC Town Hall in Folsom, Pennsylvania, U.S., October 17, 2024.
Rachel Wisniewski | Reuters
A Pennsylvania federal judge on Friday returned to state court a lawsuit against billionaire Elon Musk and his political action committee for their $1 million daily giveaway to registered voters.
The order kicking the case back out of federal court — two days after it landed there – sets the stage for Philadelphia District Attorney Larry Krasner to potentially obtain a quick order in the Philadelphia County Court of Common Pleas blocking Musk and his America PAC from awarding any more prizes to voters in Pennsylvania.
Krasner accuses Musk and the PAC of operating an illegal lottery and of trying to influence voters in the presidential election between Donald Trump and Kamala Harris.
Musk and the PAC, who are backing Trump, also are accused in the suit of violating state consumer protection laws.
U.S. District Judge Gerald Pappert in his ruling returning the case to the Court of Common Pleas dismissed arguments by Musk’s lawyers that the suit should be handled in Philadelphia federal court because it references the upcoming presidential election.
“But federal question jurisdiction does not turn on a plaintiff’s motivations in filing suit; it turns on whether the legal issues arising from the claims originate in federal or state law,” wrote Pappert, who was appointed by former President Barack Obama.
Pappert said the defendants had not identified “any question of federal law” that must be resolved in the DA’s favor “in order to prove either state-law claim.”
District Attorney of Philadelphia Larry Krasner stands with the media on the day of Elon Musk’s hearing in a lawsuit by the Philadelphia District Attorney seeking to block Donald Trump supporter Musk’s $1 million-a-day giveaway to swing state voters, at City Hall in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, U.S., October 31, 2024.
Matthew Hatcher | Reuters
Krasner’s office in a statement Friday said, “This ruling is consistent with the argument of the District Attorney that America PAC’s and Mr. Musk’s eleventh hour effort to take the case away from state court in Philadelphia was contrary to law.”
John Summers, an attorney representing Krasner’s office in the case, said, “We await the state court’s scheduling of the hearing” to consider an emergency request to halt the $1 million lottery.
CNBC has requested comment from a lawyer for Musk and PAC.
Musk on Oct. 19 said the PAC would randomly award $1 million per day until Election Day to registered voters in one of seven swing states — among them Pennsylvania — who signed a petition supporting the U.S. Constitution. The first three prize winners were from Pennsylvania.
After he was sued Monday by Krasner in the Court of Common Pleas, Musk had been ordered to appear at an emergency hearing in that state court on Thursday morning, where a judge planned to consider Krasner’s request for an injunction halting the lottery in Pennsylvania.
But on Wednesday night, lawyers for Musk and the PAC filed a notice removing the lawsuit to federal court.
On Thursday morning, after Musk failed to show at his hearing, Court of Common Pleas Judge Angelo Foglietta said the case could not proceed there, for the moment at least, because of the removal to federal court.
Summers hours later asked Pappert to return the case from federal court.
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