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Tech giant Elon Musk and Ashley St. Clair, the estranged mother of one of his 14 children, both skipped showing to Manhattan court Thursday as their lawyers negotiated child support in an ongoing bitter custody battle.
At least three attorneys for the Tesla boss trillionaire got into settlement talks with a trio of St. Clair’s lawyers, though neither Musk, 55, nor his 28-year-old ex were present for the afternoon hearing.
“I’m just being cautiously optimistic. The judge himself is very gracious,” a source on Musk’s side familiar with the case told The Post.
The source said St. Clair was seeking an “astronomical” settlement payout from Musk and noted the lawyers were due back in court next week “to try to close it out.”
St. Clair, a children’s book author who has another son from a previous relationship, sued Musk in February 2025, seeking to legally establish him as the father of their now-2-year-old boy Romulus and to get sole custody.
Musk has since done DNA testing, under a court order, confirming he’s Romulus’ dad.
St. Clair claimed in a documentary called, “Musk,” released earlier this month, that the SpaceX founder slashed her $100,000 monthly child support by $80,000 because she refused to sign a non-disclosure agreement and because she publicly disclosed in 2025 that she had his 13th child.
She said she was facing eviction, even with the $20,000 Musk was paying her each month.
Musk, for his part, alleged he paid St. Clair $2.5 million and initially said he was “not against finding out” if he was the father of her kid.
The estranged duo began seeing each other in 2023 after Musk started responding to St. Clair’s posts on X, once messaging her: “We should have a kid,” she claimed.
St. Clair claimed Musk got “weird” with her after she became pregnant, she told her followers in a TikTok video.
She said Musk offered her a lump sum of $15 million, plus $100,000 a month for 21 years – or $40 million total – but she turned it down because the deal required her silence and she didn’t want her son to feel like a secret.
She also didn’t want her son’s dignity to be a “commodity,” she told The New York Times earlier this month.
But Musk has claimed St. Clair made up that he offered her the mind-boggling figure, adding “she has a history of making false claims,” the newspaper reported.
The prolific father now has 14 children with four different women. Musk and his most recent partner, Neuralink executive Shivon Zilis, broke things off earlier this month, according to Zilis.
St. Clair claimed in the documentary that Musk texted her before she gave birth that he wanted a “legion of children before the civil war.”
St. Clair’s lawyer declined to comment on the way out of court.
The next hearing is October 29.