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The developers of the popular party game Cards Against Humanity are suing Elon Musk’s SpaceX for $15 million dollars after claiming the company has trespassed on land it bought in Cameron County over opposition to the border wall.
In a petition filed last Thursday in the 404th state District Court, Cards Against Humanity, or CAH, claims that SpaceX has trespassed and caused damage to its parcel of land that was purchased in 2017 in opposition to border wall construction during former President Donald J. Trump’s administration.
CAH said after it caught SpaceX’s alleged unauthorized activity on its land, Musk’s company gave them a 12-hour ultimatum to accept a lowball offer for less than half of the land’s value, according to a letter published online.
“We said, ‘Go f— yourself, Elon Musk. We’ll see you in court,’” CAH said in a letter published on www.elonowesyou100dollars.com, which was recently created.
As part of its 2017 holiday campaign, CAH created a supporter funded campaign to oppose Trump’s border wall plans, with the campaign highlighting the legal rights of landowners along the border “even in the face of Trump Administration tactics to prevent full and fair compensation to those local landowners,” the petition stated.
With 150,000 people each paying $15 dollars toward the effort, the petition continued to note that CAH purchased a plot of vacant land in Cameron County based on its promise to “make it as time-consuming and expensive as possible for Trump to build his wall.” According to county records, CAH’s Hole Holding LLC company purchased lot 11 block 4 at Tarpon Haven in Brownsville on Aug. 31, 2017.
Although the property wasn’t “condemned” for border wall construction during Trump’s presidency, the petition stated it has instead “become the object of another behemoth company (SpaceX) and its founder (Elon Musk),” according to the petition.
The petition provides several photographs showing its original condition since its purchase in August 2017. Various photographs depict the natural landscape familiar to Rio Grande Valley residents — cacti growing with brush vegetation.
While CAH has maintained the property as well as marking the edge of the lot with a fence and a “No Trespassing” sign, the petition noted that in the ensuing years, SpaceX has acquired several of the vacant lots along the road where the property is — a little over 3 miles away from SpaceX’s Starbase launch facility.
Another set of photographs in the petition shows heavy machinery, unfinished structures and various construction materials.
“None of the equipment, none of the materials, none of the workers depicted in these pictures are owned by or associated with CAH in any way,” the petition stated. “SpaceX has never asked for permission to use the Property, much less for the egregious appropriation of the Property for its own profit-making purposes.”
The photos show workers performing construction work, and staging materials and vehicles for work to be performed on other tracts, the petition stated.
“In short, SpaceX has treated the Property as its own for at least six (6) months without regard for CAH’s property rights nor the safety of anyone entering what has become a worksite that is presumably governed by OSHA safety requirements,” the petition stated.
The petition says SpaceX never asked for permission to conduct the activities.
“SpaceX’s abuse of this Property has not only destroyed its natural condition, but has also caused even greater harm to CAH by virtue of the damage it has caused to CAH’s relationship with its paying supporters,” the petition stated.
The petition is seeking $15 million in damages and CAH has pledged to equally split the proceeds among all 150,000 original subscribers up to $100 each.
