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To close Musk-watchers, it is not that much of a surprise that the CEO has been dogged by rumours of both infidelity and drug use, including ketamine.

But for the lady he allegedly banged while under the influence, these claims have been wildly damaging.

Nicole Shanahan, the vice presidential running mate of Robert F. Kennedy Jr – yep, the same third-party candidate who recently claimed that a worm had eaten part of his brain – was at the centre of an excoriating investigation piece that the New York Times ran recently.

It is suggested in the deeply unflattering story that RFK Jr likely picked Shanahan as a running mate primarily because she has an enormous amount of money to contribute to his campaign. Her large fortune, which reportedly totals over $1 billion, was gained from a settlement after her divorce from Sergey Brin, the billionaire co-founder of Google. Their split was apparently precipitated, according to the newspaper’s reporting, by a ketamine-fueled tryst with SpaceX and Tesla CEO Elon Musk.

 

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Futurism runs with the scandal:

“At that party, Elon Musk and Ms. Shanahan took ketamine, a popular party drug that is legal with a prescription, and disappeared together for several hours, according to four people briefed on the event and documents related to it,” the NYT reported. “Ms. Shanahan later told Mr. Brin that she had had sex with Mr. Musk, three of the people said. She also relayed the details to friends, family and advisers.”

In an exclusive interview with PEOPLE about the affair allegation (which she strongly denies), the 37-year-old attorney, philanthropist and investor reveals how “debilitating” the aftermath was for her and her career:

“My career has been based on academic and intellectual credibility, and I was being shamed internationally for being a cheater,” says Shanahan. “To be known because of a sexual act is one of the most humiliating things . . . it was utterly debilitating.”

When the Wall Street Journal report was published last July, in which those unnamed sources claimed this “brief affair,” including a December 2021 “liaison” with Musk she said she remembered “feeling like everything I had ever worked for was under siege by a press cycle that had no idea what was going on in my life,” Shanahan says, “and who I was.”

 

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A post shared by Nicole Shanahan (@theshanawow)

She insists that she was never more than friends with Musk, whose pal Brin had helped fund Tesla, the automaker that helped make Musk the world’s richest person, worth $238 billion. Brin is now the world’s 11th richest person, worth around $97 billion.

“Did Elon and I have sex, like it was a moment of passion, and then it was over? No,” she says. “Did we have a romantic relationship? No. We didn’t have an affair.”

Instead, she and Musk had simply talked about how she might be able to help her autistic daughter, given his experience in  Neuralink, his neurotechnology company.

“It was a conversation that was very meaningful about life and how people show up for one another. To be painted with such a massive scarlet letter for it just seems so unfair.”

Her divorce from Brin finally concluded after a 17-month legal process, during which she survived a “wave of chaos” from the scandal, which had a decidedly sexist slant, with online trolls calling her a “gold digger” and making vulgar comments about her.

“It’s been a long journey,” she tells PEOPLE in an exclusive interview. “Today is a turning point of letting go. I’m happy I’ve arrived at a point where I can reflect on my story.”

As for Musk, he has defended his ketamine use in the past by saying it was prescribed. While it’s true that there’s some interest in the potentially therapeutic mental health benefits of the drug, there’s also a lot of expert scepticism. Most people, at the end of the day, just take it to have a good time.

He does, too, strongly deny slamming it at a party in the context of an extramarital dalliance.

[source:futurism]