Ex-CNN star slaps Elon Musk with lawsuit over dropped X show

Don Lemon, a former CNN star presenter, has filed a lawsuit against Elon Musk, the owner of social media platform X, alleging that the tech billionaire and his company unjustly ended a partnership with him.

The lawsuit further alleges that Musk, 53, failed to pay Lemon, 58, after using his name to attract advertisers to the social media platform, the BBC reported.

Earlier this year, X had struck deals with Lemon, former United States congresswoman Tulsi Gabbard, and sport radio host Jim Rome as part of its efforts to regain advertisers after facing several controversies.

"The lawsuit alleges fraud, negligent misrepresentation, and misappropriation of name and likeness," said a post on the Facebook page of the law firm representing Lemon.

According to the allegations in the filing with the California Superior Court in San Francisco, X had agreed to pay Lemon $1.5 million and a share of advertising revenue, but then cancelled the partnership after Lemon had spent thousands of dollars on creating the show

However, the deal which would have seen The Don Lemon Show appearing on X collapsed abruptly in March after the recording of the first episode, which featured an interview with the SpaceX CEO.

In a post on X shortly after the deal fell through, Musk said Lemon's approach "was basically just 'CNN, but on social media,' which doesn't work, as evidenced by the fact that CNN is dying."

During the interview, which was recorded at Tesla's headquarters in Texas, Lemon asked Musk about his use of the drug ketamine, as well as the increase of hate speech on X.

Lemon had been with CNN for 17 years when he was fired in April 2023 after he made on-air comments about then Republican presidential candidate Nikki Haley being past her prime.

Shortly after Lemon's exit from CNN, Musk, who was looking to attract advertisers back to X at the time, reached out to him.

X had been reeling from a string of controversies that followed the billionaire's takeover in 2022.