Former xAI Engineer Sues Elon Musk’s Companies Over AI Safety Whistleblower Dismissal
By James Dargan · · 1 min read
Devin Kim, a former engineer at xAI, has filed suit against the company and its parent SpaceX in a California state court, alleging he was dismissed in retaliation for raising repeated concerns about safety failures in the development of Grok, xAI’s AI chatbot.
Kim, who departed xAI in September 2025 and was recently named president of the nonprofit Center for AI Safety, claims his dismissal was orchestrated by xAI co-founder Jimmy Ba, who left the company earlier this year. The lawsuit alleges Ba ignored directives from Elon Musk to implement proper safety processes and retaliated against Kim to suppress his complaints about Grok’s potential to spread discriminatory content and weapons-related information.
The complaint was filed days before SpaceX is expected to debut in what could become the largest IPO in history. Kim is seeking compensatory and punitive damages. Neither xAI nor SpaceX responded to requests for comment.
