A Texas Judge Would Not Let OpenAI Read The Apple Settlement.
X Corp and SpaceXAI dropped Apple. OpenAI asked to see the deal. The court said the ChatGPT maker does not get it.
A federal style courthouse facade. Photo: public domain, via Wikimedia Commons.
OpenAI asked a Texas federal judge to force Elon Musk's companies to hand over the confidential settlement they just reached with Apple. On Thursday, Judge Mark Pittman said no.
He read the agreement in chambers. Then he wrote that it does not present information relevant to the issues that will be decided at summary judgment or at trial. The antitrust case still goes forward. The ChatGPT maker does not get to see the deal.
What OpenAI wanted
X Corp and SpaceXAI sued Apple and OpenAI last year, saying Apple's ChatGPT integration on iPhones was an unlawful way to lock up the consumer AI market. Apple has said the integration was not exclusive. OpenAI has denied wrongdoing.
Musk's companies told the court this week they had agreed to drop their claims against Apple. OpenAI's response was a motion to compel. If the settlement terms undercut the remaining claims, OpenAI wanted those terms in the record.
What the judge actually did
Pittman, sitting in Fort Worth, reviewed the papers privately. Courts sometimes order production of confidential settlements when the terms matter to a live issue. He said this one does not. Reuters reported the ruling on September 18, 2026. Politico had the same holding the night before: the deal is irrelevant to the issues the court will ultimately decide.
The trial is set for January. Apple is out. OpenAI is not. And the document OpenAI said would help its defense stays sealed.
Why this belongs here
ChatGPT is the product named in the complaint. The company that ships it tried to read a private settlement between a co defendant and the plaintiff, lost, and now walks into summary judgment without it. That is not a hallucination in a brief. That is a court refusing to let the ChatGPT maker see a document it claimed it needed.