Elon Musk’s bio reveals that he had a third child with Grimes

It’s only been a few days since a seemingly painful dispute over parenting between Elon Musk and ex-partner Grimes spilled over to social media. But as a new biography of the controversial billionaire approaches, surprising details about Musk’s life continue to leak out. The latest detail, while less incendiary than the news that it would halt a Ukrainian military effort, still raises eyebrows: Elon would have not two, but Three children with Grimes, bringing the number of Musk’s earthly offspring to at least ten.

This last detail is provided to us by the biographer Walter Isaacson, whose close relationship with the owner of X (formerly Twitter) includes years as his shadow and bizarre morning messages. Isaacson’s book on the tycoon, Elon Muskwill be released on September 12th and, while several publications have extracted an excerpt, the New York Times seems to have the first review.

Within this assessment, Grimes is referred to as “the mother of three of Musk’s children (the existence of the third, Techno Mechanicusnicknamed Tau, has thus far been kept confidential),” a surprising piece of information considering that, just last week, Grimes tweeted “You need to tell Elon to show me my son or reply to my lawyer” before deleting the post.

When Grimes’ post was first noticed, people (including yours truly) speculated that the son Grimes was referring to was X Æ A-12, three years old; the couple also shares a daughter, Exa Dark Sideræl Musk, born in December 2021. According to the NYT, “Musk didn’t tell Grimes that he had just had twins with one of his employees” when Exa was born, bringing the number of his living biological children to nine. (Another of Musk’s sons, Nevada Alexander Musk, died in infancy in 2002.)

Second Shivon Zilisthe mother of the twins in question, Musk “really wants smart people to have kids,” Isaacson says, and “offered to be her sperm donor” so that “the kids would be genetically his.”

But at some point after the donation, Musk – or his genetic material – apparently returned to Grimes. “Isaacson’s book reveals that Musk’s ex-girlfriend, the musician Claire Boucher, whose stage name is Grimes, had a new baby last year,” reports the CBS Sunday Morningsuggesting that this child, the tenth known to have been born, was born after the twins.

Since then, it seems that relations between Musk and Grimes have soured: last week Grimes tweeted, regarding the twins, that “I have never been allowed to see a photo of these children until this moment, despite the situation has completely destroyed my family,” but more children with Musk are consistent with the hopes she expressed to Vanity Fair last year, saying the couple “always wanted at least three or four,” even though they were no longer together in the traditional sense of the term.