"District Judge Reed O'Connor of the Northern District of Texas, who recently refused to recuse himself from the case despite having purchased Tesla stock, denied Media Matters' motion to dismiss."
Love how judges are supposed to self-police. I mean, they're "Honorable"... Right?!? ¯\_(ツ)_/¯
It seems like buying Tesla stock and then making inane judicial decisions to boost the value of your Tesla stock would go beyond just the appearance of impropriety and into the world of actual criminal activity.
The problem is proving that the inane judicial decision was made to boost the value of their stock rather than some other reason. That's why it's generally "even the appearance of impropriety" to side step trying to definitively determine the why.