He actually didn't lie... This whole thing is a sham. He talked to a Saudi sovereign wealth fund who told him they could take it private at $420 a share if he was interested. Elon said he was mulling that option around. Which is exactly what his tweet said... The SEC is far over-reaching in this case. How would they know who he did or didn't talk to and their interest level in taking it private?! They couldn't...
He said "secured" is where he got into trouble. Implying it was farther along in the process.
If a very wealth person, that you had a good relationship with, said they would buy your construction business if you were interested in selling to them, wouldn't you say that you had secured a buyer?!
No, not if it is not on paper, and when you have thousands of people involved in investing it must have I's dotted and t's crossed not just a conversation to be tweeted, and he also registered his tweets as news announcements. So they can fall under those guide lines.