S’pore High Court halts defamation suit filed by X Corp, says case should be heard in US

Source: Straits Times
Article Date: 23 Jun 2026
Author: Selina Lum

Judge says case against non-profit US site should be heard in Texas court.

The High Court has stayed a defamation lawsuit filed in Singapore by a subsidiary of Elon Musk’s social media company X Corp against a non-profit United States media monitoring site.

In a judgment on June 19, Judicial Commissioner Low Siew Ling said Singapore was the wrong place to hear the case, which arose from an article published by the defendant, Media Matters for America.

She said the Texas court, where a trial is scheduled to start in March 2027 over the same article, was “clearly and distinctly the more appropriate forum” to resolve the claims.

On Nov 16, 2023, Media Matters published an article on its website which said that advertisements from major brands had been placed alongside pro-Nazi content on the X platform.

Musk, who recently became the world’s first trillionaire following the Nasdaq debut of his aerospace company SpaceX, had then vowed a “thermonuclear lawsuit” against Media Matters.

His public threat of legal action followed moves by major companies such as Apple and IBM to pause advertising on the social media platform formerly known as Twitter.

On Nov 20, 2023, X Corp filed a lawsuit in a US district court in Texas against Media Matters and the reporter who wrote the article. The organisation’s chief executive was later added as a defendant.

This was followed by a lawsuit filed on Dec 6, 2023, in Ireland’s High Court. The lawsuit for defamation and malicious falsehood was filed by X Corp’s Irish subsidiary, an entity named Twitter International Unlimited.

More than seven months later, on July 23, 2024, the Singapore case was filed by X Corp’s Singapore subsidiary, an entity named Twitter Asia Pacific (TAP).

TAP, which deals with advertising clients in the Asia-Pacific region, sought special damages of US$26 million (S$33.6 million) in lost advertising revenue.

Media Matters responded by challenging the jurisdiction of the Singapore court.

On Oct 24, 2025, an assistant registrar concluded that the Singapore court was not the appropriate forum.

TAP, which was represented by Mr Andy Leck from Wong & Leow, appealed.

It argued that the offending statements had been published in Singapore and that it had suffered damage in Singapore.

Media Matters, represented by Ms Lin Shumin from Drew & Napier, maintained that the US was the appropriate place to hear the case.

The judge agreed that the case has very close links to the US.

The article was written and published in the US, the X platform is operated from the US, and the vast majority of the relevant witnesses and evidence is located there.

Having so many witnesses fly into Singapore to testify would be costly, she said.

“This would place a particular strain on the respondent, which is a non-profit entity and, unlike the appellant, not part of a large and well-financed corporate group,” said the judge.

The judge added that there was also insufficient evidence to show that the article was published in Singapore.

She said that the parallel proceedings in Texas cover substantially the same issues and are at a much more advanced stage, with more than 400,000 documents disclosed and a trial expected to start on March 29, 2027.