Levine has addressed this in past columns. Of course the courts have such authority, but individual people have to enforce the court's decisions, and sometimes those people are reluctant to take on Musk.
Musk is a special case because he has done things like threatening to ruin the careers of SEC lawyers who have come after him, and he has the power to make that happen.
Is this illegal? Probably. Does Musk get away with it? Yes.
You're talking about Musk pressuring Cooley to fire a lawyer who previously worked against him at the SEC. But the result was that Cooley told Musk no. Hardly a success story for Musk.
There's no shortage of law firms willing to go up against billionaires. Hell, there's no shortage of firms willing to go up against criminal enterprises like drug cartels.
The idea that Musk is somehow more threatening than the types that the US court system regularly puts under their thumb is simply laughable.
So what? This is business as usual for law firms. They will lose clients every time they take a case due to conflicts of interest and so on, even if everyone has a happy outcome.
What Musk did was petty and questionable, but it didn't fundamentally change anything for Cooley.
It's unlikely Musk expected Cooley to cave to his ridiculous demand. It's very likely the intended target for this action was every person who deals with Musk's future illegal actions.
Musk is a special case because he has done things like threatening to ruin the careers of SEC lawyers who have come after him, and he has the power to make that happen.
Is this illegal? Probably. Does Musk get away with it? Yes.