On Monday, August 3, at 10:54 AM, the official Team Trump TikTok account posted a video of Donald and Melania Trump watching fireworks.

Over the footage?

“Mood because it’s August and Donald Trump is your President.”

Below the footage, the song “august” by Taylor Swift, from folklore.

And, the caption:

“I’m sure @Taylor Swift is going to be super excited we used her song!”

Which either suggests something was already going on behind the scenes, or was a ridiculous dare.

Tag the most famous woman in the world, use her trending song to do it, and wait for the statement, the Instagram Story, the outrage from Taylor Swift fans that turns their post into a news cycle.

She never posted. She never spoke. She did not take the bait.

Within days, the audio was just gone.

The video is still up (289,000 likes and counting) but where the song used to be, TikTok now displays a single line: “The copyright owner hasn’t made this sound available in your country.”

On desktop it’s: “This sound isn’t available.”

And that, my dear friends, was only the beginning.

The timeline

August 3. The bait post goes up, set to “august,” caption tags Taylor Swift directly. (The video is still live, go listen to the silence yourself.)

By August 6. The “august” audio is dead. Team Trump’s response to losing the song is kind of what you would expect. It’s a new post: a mock album cover of Trump’s face over the word RED, titled “Red (Donald Trump’s Version),” captioned “Did you know Taylor Swift wrote a whole album about the color of the Republican Party👀” complete with a fake Spotify tracklist.

“Everything Has Changed (At Our Southern Border).”

“We Are Never Ever Getting Back Together (The Biden Harris Administration).”

“The Last Time (An Autopen Runs The Country).”

The post used a live recording of “Red” as its sound. (Breitbart covered the trolling, which tells you who thought they were winning.)

August 8–9. Reuters reports that the Red post’s audio is gone too.

So is “Father Figure” and “Opalite” (both from The Life of a Showgirl) on other Trump-related posts, says TMZ.

The National counts roughly ten Swift tracks suddenly quiet across Team Trump and White House accounts.

This weekend. MORE. Back on November 2, 2025, the official White House account posted a 22-second flex reel set to “The Fate of Ophelia,” captioned “OUR VIBES 🇺🇸.”

When the press asked why an administration whose leader claims to hate Taylor Swift was using her music, a White House official told Us Weekly:

“We made this video because we knew fake news media brands would breathlessly amplify them. Congrats, you got played.”

That video has 1.4 million likes.

As of Saturday morning, it still had its sound. As of this writing, it doesn’t. The top recent comment says it for everyone: “’This sound isnt available’ 😂 GO TAYLOR!”

The soundtrack is gone

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Wait. How Does This Even Work?

Let’s be annoying about how this all works, since neither Swift’s team, nor TikTok, nor the White House has said a word about who initiated any of this. All three declined or ignored comment requests.

TikTok doesn’t own its music.

It licenses it from rights holders, and those licenses aren’t all-or-nothing.

A rights holder can restrict where, and in what contexts, a sound is available.

That’s what the on-screen message means: “the copyright owner hasn’t made this sound available” is TikTok’s language for an availability restriction, so it’s not a copyright strike, not a takedown notice, and not a lawsuit.

Taylor Swift’s songs still work fine on your For You page.

They’ve been switched off where the rights holder doesn’t want them.

Which raises the question. Who’s the rights holder?

Since May 30, 2025, the answer is Taylor Swift.

She bought back her original master recordings from Shamrock Capital, a deal reportedly worth around $360 million, and she has long controlled her own publishing.

There is no label to consult, no committee, no licensing intermediary with veto power over who gets to use her music.

In her own handwriting, on her own website:

“All of the music I’ve ever made… now belongs… to me.”

And we know it matters here.

How/Why? Because when Universal Music Group pulled its entire catalog from TikTok in early 2024 over a licensing dispute, Swift’s music came back early because she controls her own rights and could deal with TikTok directly.

She has had her own hand on this particular switch for years. Nobody has confirmed she flipped it this month. But nobody really has to.

That’s what ownership allows her to do. Speak without giving them the fire / fight / press they want.

The boring legal rule nobody’s talking about?

Press is not really reporting on it, so here I am to be annoying, but this is worth knowing.

TikTok has a longstanding policy for Government, Politician, and Political Party Accounts, which is the category that covers both @whitehouse and, functionally, a campaign operation like @teamtrump.

Under that policy, since 2022, political accounts don’t get the general music library at all. TikTok’s playbook for these accounts states: “GPPPAs are restricted to the use of the Commercial Music Library (CML)” which is a pool of pre-cleared, royalty-free stock tracks.

Not Taylor Swift. Not Bad Bunny.

Stock. Tracks.

So, I guess the real question should not really be about why the songs vanished.

It should be about why official political accounts were running commercial music in the first place.

TikTok changed no policy this month, despite what you might read online (or watch in a TikTok video).

The removals are rights-holder action, not platform enforcement, but on TikTok’s written rules, these sounds arguably should NEVER HAVE BEEN on those accounts at all.

He hated her. They kept using her music anyway.

Let the record reflect…

On September 15, 2024, at 10:44 a.m., after Swift endorsed Kamala Harris, Trump posted five words on Truth Social, all caps: “I HATE TAYLOR SWIFT!”

By May 2025 he was asking whether anyone had noticed that since he said it, she was “no longer ‘HOT.’”

The original post is still there, 12.1 thousand ReTruths and counting.

And through all of it, the hate, the insults about her looks, the AI-generated fake endorsement images, his team kept using her music.

“The Fate of Ophelia” for the White House brag reel.

“august” for the fireworks.

“Father Figure.” “Opalite.” “Red.”

Men like him have have seemed to always believe that two things can coexist, that you can publicly degrade a woman and keep harvesting the value of her work.

Sadly, structurally, they’ve been right.

The labels owned the masters.

The platforms held the licenses.

The woman held a microphone and a choice between responding and being called hysterical or crazy, or staying silent and being called out for staying silent.

Taylor Swift spent two decades and a reported $360 million making sure that math no longer applies to her.

She’s not the only one

Two days before the Swift removals began, the White House posted a deportation montage, ICE raids, set to Bad Bunny (YES, WTAF) and that audio went silent too.

A pattern is forming, and it’s more of a legal pattern than a PR one.

Artists who control their rights are discovering they don’t need a statement, a lawsuit, or a public fight.

They are not giving them the press fight or the attention that they want.

What we don’t know

Taylor Swift has not confirmed that she requested these removals.

TikTok has not identified who initiated them.

The White House and the campaign haven’t commented.

What is verifiable (and what I verified myself, again, this morning, before publishing this) is that the posts are silent, the message names “the copyright owner,” and since May 30, 2025, the copyright owner of Taylor Swift’s catalog is Taylor Swift.

Women are told constantly that strength must be loud. That not responding means you’re scared. That silence means the bully won.

But sometimes silence simply means you don’t get my attention. You don’t get my outrage. You don’t get to use my music under your post about fireworks.

Trump’s team wanted Taylor Swift’s anger to power its content. It wanted a fight with the world’s most famous woman as free promotion.

Instead it got a licensing decision.

You can rage-bait a woman. You cannot force her to reply.

Not one word. And somehow, she managed to respond.

That’s a lesson I am going to take today.

Everything above is based on publicly available reporting and the sources linked here. The commentary, analysis and conclusions are my opinions based on that public record, not a claim of personal or inside knowledge. Where something is disputed or unconfirmed, I’ve said so. This reflects the information available at the time of posting, and I’ll correct it if credible new information emerges. Will always and forever post receipts.

If you’re just here for the summary: Wayfarer Studios, Justin Baldoni, and others, sued The New York Times for $250 million over the “We Can Bury Anyone” article about Blake Lively and Justin Baldoni.

A judge dismissed every claim against the Times, with prejudice.

Then the Times did something most people don’t know is possible. It walked across the street to New York state court and sued Wayfarer back under New York’s anti-SLAPP law.

On July 27, 2026, Justice Lebovits of the New York state court ruled that Wayfarer’s lawsuit against the Times “lack[ed] a substantial basis in fact and law” and ordered Wayfarer to pay the Times $171,616.20, plus interest the Times never even asked for. (NYSCEF Doc. No. 34.)

The last time this exact statute, argued by this exact Times lawyer, was used against a powerful man who sued the newspaper over a story he didn’t like?

That man was Donald Trump. He was ordered to pay $392,638.69.

Same law. Same New York Times lawyer. Same lesson. Let’s look at how it works and why it is important, even if you do not care about celebrities or celebrity lawsuits.

Part 1: What Even Is a SLAPP?

SLAPP stands for Strategic Lawsuit Against Public Participation.

It’s a lawsuit that isn’t really trying to win.

It’s trying to cost you something, money, time, sleep, silence. All of the above.

Think of it this way. If I publish something true about a powerful person and they sue me for $250 million, they don’t need to be right. They need me to spend two years and six figures proving they’re wrong. The lawsuit is the punishment. The legal process (discovery, motions, depositions, billable hours) becomes a weapon aimed at anyone who can’t afford to be sued, which let’s be honest, is almost everyone.

That’s the business model. You don’t sue to win. You sue to cause harm. It happens every single day.

For decades, the powerful ran this play against journalists, activists, whistleblowers, online reviewers, and yes, people who report workplace harassment or assault.

So states started passing anti-SLAPP laws.

New York’s (unfortunately) used to be famously weak, basically limited to disputes about real estate permits (truly, no one was scared of it).

Then in November 2020, New York overhauled it. The modern version has two moving parts:

• Civil Rights Law § 76-a asks: was the lawsuit aimed at speech “in a place open to the public or a public forum in connection with an issue of public interest”? Courts read “public interest” broadly, on purpose.

• Civil Rights Law § 70-a is the part with teeth: if the SLAPP was “commenced or continued without a substantial basis in fact and law,” the target doesn’t just get the case dismissed. It “shall” recover its attorney fees. Not may. Shall.

New York decided that if you use a lawsuit as a weapon against protected speech, you pay for both sides of the fight you picked.

One more thing most people (including, apparently, some very expensive legal teams) don’t realize: § 70-a says a SLAPP target “may maintain an action“ for those damages. So the shield comes with a sword. You can lose your SLAPP suit and then discover that the newspaper you sued is now suing you.

That is exactly what happened here.

The Timeline

Follow the dates, because they tell the a very interesting story. (Timeline per the Times’ complaint, NYSCEF Doc. No. 1 ¶¶ 11–27, and the court’s decision, NYSCEF Doc. No. 34 at 1–2.)

December 21, 2024: The Times publishes “’We Can Bury Anyone’: Inside a Hollywood Smear Machine,” reporting on Blake Lively’s California Civil Rights Department complaint.

December 31, 2024: Wayfarer and its affiliates sue the Times in California state court for defamation and false light. Here’s my favorite detail in the entire docket: they never served it. (NYSCEF Doc. No. 1 ¶ 12.) A quarter-billion-dollar lawsuit that existed for the press, not for the courtroom. I genuinely cannot think of a better one-sentence definition of a SLAPP.

January 31, 2025: Wayfarer adds the Times to the consolidated federal case in the Southern District of New York, defamation, false light, promissory fraud, implied breach of contract.

June 9, 2025: Judge Lewis Liman dismisses every claim against the Times, with prejudice. The fraud and contract claims he calls “meritless.” The defamation claims fail on privilege and actual-malice grounds, and if you read my earlier breakdowns, you know he went further, writing that the Times “had evidence to support” the smear-campaign narrative and that a reader of the texts “would have little doubt.” Lively v. Wayfarer Studios LLC, 2025 WL 1640388 (S.D.N.Y. June 9, 2025). Some people want you to overlook those comments. That post is available here.

July 2025: Here’s a detail you will not find in any headline, because I found it in an hours log. The Times’ Deputy General Counsel, David McCraw, spent much of July 2025 drafting settlement letters, trying to resolve the fee question quietly with Wayfarer’s counsel before ever filing suit. (NYSCEF Doc. No. 19.) Wayfarer could have written a check with no docket number attached. It didn’t.

September 30, 2025: So the Times sues. The New York Times Company v. Wayfarer Studios LLC, Index No. 162963/2025 — a freestanding anti-SLAPP action under § 70-a. And notice who signed it? The Times represented itself, in-house, through McCraw and Jackson Busch. The newspaper’s lawyer, doing this (checks notes) again.

January 14, 2026: The Times moves for summary judgment, seeking $181,622.70, and files its receipts: outside-counsel invoices, in-house hours, and (hold this thought for later) a copy of Trump v. Trump. (NYSCEF Doc. Nos. 9–19.)

February 27, 2026: Wayfarer responds. And this is important, because I insist on being fair even to parties I’m writing critically about (despite what others will tell you) Wayfarer never argued that its lawsuit had merit. Not once, in any brief, in this entire action. It filed a cross-motion asking the court to pause the case while it maybe-someday appealed the federal dismissal, “reserving the right” to argue the merits later. (NYSCEF Doc. Nos. 21–30; Decision at 3 n.1.)

May 2026: The maybe-someday appeal dies, because as part of the settlement in the federal case between Blake Lively and Justin Baldoni, the parties signed a stipulation irrevocably waiving any right to appeal the federal orders, including the dismissal of Wayfarer’s claims against the Times. (NYSCEF Doc. No. 33; Decision at 2.) After that, Wayfarer filed... nothing. No opposition. No request for leave. Nothing.

July 27, 2026: Justice Lebovits rules.

What the Judge Actually Held

Three holdings, each one a quiet OMG for anyone thinking about suing a newspaper to make a story go away.

First: yes, the sword is real. The court confirmed that a SLAPP target “may bring a separate, freestanding action for anti-SLAPP attorney fees (as NYT Co. has done here).” (Decision at 3.) You can finish losing your lawsuit against a speaker and then get served with theirs.

Second: this was a SLAPP. The article and video were speech in a public forum, the Times’ website is, in the words of the case law the Times cited, “a quintessential public forum” about sexual harassment and retaliation allegations on a famous film set. Matters of public interest, easily. (Decision at 4; NYSCEF Doc. No. 10 at 5.)

Third: because the federal court dismissed Wayfarer’s claims for failure to state a claim, “those claims lack a substantial basis in fact and law for Civil Rights Act 70-a purposes.” (Decision at 5.)

Yes, this is a court saying the $250 million lawsuit wasn’t a close call that came up short. It’s saying that even accepting everything Wayfarer alleged as true, there was never a legally viable case there. That’s what “without a substantial basis in fact and law” means. It is the court’s version of “this should never have been filed.”

And because I know someone in my comments is warming up their keyboard: no, this is not a jury finding that every sentence the Times printed was true.

I’ve said that in every piece and I’ll say it here. It’s something narrower and, honestly, in some ways more damning: a finding about the lawsuit, that the case brought to damage the story never had a substantial legal leg to stand on.

Wayfarer had two chances to argue otherwise (in its opposition papers, and again after the settlement mooted its stay request) and used neither.

That was a choice.

The Money

This is the section nobody else will write, because nobody else read the invoices. (I did. You’re welcome.)

The Times asked for $181,622.70, in two buckets (Decision at 5–6; NYSCEF Doc. Nos. 11, 16, 19):

• $153,074.70 billed by outside counsel Davis Wright Tremaine for defending the federal case, including about $94,000 in March 2025 alone, the month the motion to dismiss was built. That’s what it cost them to kill a $250 million lawsuit at the pleading stage. That’s the price of the fight Wayfarer picked.

• $28,548 of in-house time litigating the fee case itself, “fees on fees,” which the court awarded because the whole point of § 70-a is “to protect speakers on matters of public concern from being silenced by meritless litigation,” and a speaker isn’t protected if vindication costs more than surrender. (Decision at 6.)

Now watch what Justice Lebovits did, because this is one of the reasons the ruling will be hard to appeal. Even though Wayfarer never objected to a single line item, the court reviewed the fees anyway, decided some post-dismissal work wasn’t recoverable, and cut about $10,000 from the request. (Decision at 5–6.) Then he awarded prejudgment interest that the Times had never requested, in the complaint or the motion, because under New York law, interest on this kind of award is “a matter of right.” (Decision at 6–7.)

The court independently trimmed the newspaper’s request and gave it more than it asked for. The Judge did this carefully which is exactly what you want when the ruling is going to be quoted (hi) by people like me.

Final judgment: $171,616.20, with interest, plus costs. (Decision at 8.)

The Trump Parallel The Times Filed

When the Times needed to show Justice Lebovits how § 70-a fee awards work in practice, it reached for a precedent. The one it chose and filed on this docket as Exhibit F, is Trump v. Trump, Index No. 453299/2021. (NYSCEF Doc. No. 17.)

As a refresher, Donald Trump sued his niece Mary Trump, the Times, and three of its reporters over the Pulitzer-winning investigation of his tax returns. The court dismissed his claims against the Times defendants and held he had to pay their fees under (say it with me) Civil Rights Law § 70-a(1)(a). In January 2024, those fees were quantified: $392,638.69. Trump’s lawyers called the bill “exorbitant.” The court called it reasonable, and ordered the clerk to enter judgment. (NYSCEF Doc. No. 17 at 2–3.) And the lawyer on the Times’ side of that fee fight? David McCraw. The same in-house lawyer who just did it to Wayfarer.

So here is the (recent) scoreboard for New York’s anti-SLAPP law versus powerful men who sued this one newspaper over stories they hated…

Donald Trump: $392,638.69.

Wayfarer Studios: $171,616.20.

The New York Times: undefeated.

I want to be extremely clear about why this comparison matters, and it’s not the celebrity of it. It’s the pattern. A president-to-be and a Hollywood studio ran the same play: don’t disprove the story, price the story.

Sue the journalists, let the process do the punishing, and count on the fact that most speakers can’t afford to be right.

New York’s legislature saw that play coming in 2020 and rigged the field so it fails.

Thank you, New York.

Why Should YOU Care Even If You’ve Never Watched It Ends With Us And Don’t Care About Celebrities?

Because you speak in public forums every day.

The same statute that just protected the New York Times protects the nurse who leaves an honest one-star review, the tenant who organizes against a landlord, the local reporter covering a developer, the woman who reports her boss, and, I’ll just say it, the mom with a legal Substack who gets threatened for providing her opinions.

SLAPPs are not a celebrity problem. They are a you problem, and roughly thirty-plus states have some version of this shield while the strength varies wildly, and there is still no real federal anti-SLAPP statute, which is why cases like this one and Trump v. Trump had to be fought under state law in state court.

The machine we talked about in my last piece promised it could “bury anyone” and that the work would be “untraceable.” The lawsuit against the Times was the same theory dressed up in a suit and tie: make the truth expensive enough and it disappears.

New York’s answer to that? You pay.

The TLDR? A studio that hired a crisis team to bury a woman, then sued a newspaper to bury the story, ended a nineteen-month legal campaign having recovered $0.00, and has now been ordered to pay a $171,616.20 check to the journalists.

If you want to know whether the system can still protect speech about powerful men, this is proof. It can.

© 2026 More With MJ. All rights reserved. Quoting excerpts with attribution and a link is welcome and encouraged. The court records cited and pictured are public documents, Index No. 162963/2025 (NYSCEF, N.Y. County) and No. 24-cv-10049 (S.D.N.Y.), and may be shared freely. That’s rather the point.

Before we get to the documents, I want to talk about the people who found them first.

Megan Twohey is one of the reporters who broke the Harvey Weinstein story: reporting that won the Pulitzer Prize for Public Service, launched a global reckoning, and held up under years of the most hostile scrutiny money could buy.

Julie Tate is one of the most respected investigative researchers in American journalism.

In December 2024, they and Mike McIntire published a meticulously documented investigation for the New York Times, built on primary-source text messages, showing that a crisis PR operation had been hired to bury a woman who complained about her workplace. That woman was Blake Lively.

For that, Twohey and her colleagues were dragged for two years. Called liars. Called plants. Accused of fabricating and “doctoring” evidence. Sued. An entire cottage industry of content creators, many of whom never read a single court filing, built audiences by mocking a reporter whose track record of accuracy is nearly unmatched in this business, while amplifying the talking points of the very PR machine her reporting exposed.

The irony?

The story was about a covert campaign to discredit a woman for speaking up, and the response was an overt campaign to discredit the women who reported it.

So here is how that turned out. The lawsuit against the Times was dismissed. This July, a New York judge ordered Baldoni’s studio to pay the Times $171,616.20 under the state’s anti-SLAPP law: a ruling that required the court to find the case against the journalists “lacked a substantial basis in fact and law.”

And the texts they were accused of doctoring are now public court records, Bates-stamped, unedited, and worse than what they printed.

Twohey, Tate, and McIntire didn’t get it wrong. They got it first.

The cast, before we begin:

Justin Baldoni: Director and co-star of It Ends With Us; co-founder of Wayfarer Studios; built his brand on books and a podcast about healthy masculinity.

Jamey Heath: Wayfarer’s CEO, Baldoni’s close friend, and a producer on the film; named alongside Baldoni in Lively’s on-set complaints.

Steve Sarowitz: The billionaire who bankrolled Wayfarer and the film (~$30 million); Baldoni’s co-chairman.

Wayfarer Studios: Baldoni and Sarowitz’s production company. The entity that hired everyone below.

Jennifer Abel: Baldoni and Wayfarer’s longtime publicist; a VP at the PR firm Jonesworks until September 2024, when she left to launch her shop, RWA. The “Jen” in most of these texts.

Stephanie Jones: Founder of Jonesworks, Wayfarer’s PR agency of record, and Abel’s boss. Warned Wayfarer against hiring Melissa Nathan.

Melissa Nathan: Crisis PR specialist and founder of TAG (The Agency Group PR); past clients include Johnny Depp and Drake. Author of “you know we can bury anyone.”

Katie Case & Brianna “Bree” Koslow: Nathan’s team at TAG. Case took the intake notes and connected the digital vendor; Koslow pitched the Daily Mail pieces.

Jed Wallace: The “digital” man. Founder of Street Relations, hired in August 2024 for “social/digital mitigation and remediation.” Communicated by Signal. You’ll see why.

Bryan Freedman: The litigator for Baldoni, Wayfarer, and the PR team; the “completely false” and “doctored communications” quotes are his.

Blake Lively: Co-star and, ultimately, credited producer of the film. Complained about on-set conduct in 2023, negotiated written protections to return to work, and filed the complaint that started the public phase of this in December 2024.

Megan Twohey, Mike McIntire & Julie Tate: The New York Times team that reported “’We Can Bury Anyone’” and got sued for it.

On December 21, 2024, the New York Times published “‘We Can Bury Anyone’: Inside a Hollywood Smear Machine.”

Within hours, Justin Baldoni’s lawyer Bryan Freedman called the claims “completely false, outrageous and intentionally salacious.”

Within weeks, he had sued the Times for $250 million and Blake Lively, Ryan Reynolds, and their publicist for $400 million.

He told Deadline the article was built on “doctored communications.”

Content creators repeated it daily: hit piece. Fabricated. Cherry-picked. Doctored. FAKE. The texts were altered.

That was the story we were told for two years.

Then came discovery. Depositions. Hundreds of thousands of produced documents.

And in January 2026, under court order, the summary judgment record became public.

So let’s do something nobody seems to want to do. Let’s start with what a federal judge actually found, and then read the evidence available on the docket and compare it to the original article.

What the judge found in Spring 2025

On June 9, 2025, Judge Liman of the Southern District of New York dismissed the Wayfarer parties’ entire lawsuit, the $400 million case against Lively and Reynolds, and the defamation case against the New York Times. Lively v. Wayfarer Studios LLC, 2025 WL 1640388 (S.D.N.Y. June 9, 2025).

What follows isn’t my opinion. It’s his.

On the texts they spent a year calling fake?

The court noted that the authenticity of the messages “ha[s] not been disputed by the Wayfarer Parties” and that “[t]here are no allegations that the messages suggestive of a smear campaign were inauthentic.”

The people screaming “doctored” on podcasts never once said it in court, where saying it has consequences.

On what those texts show, the Judge walked through the record.

“She can be buried,” the Scenario Planning document, “the social combat plan,” “plant pieces... of how horrible Blake is to work with,” “[t]his is what we would need,” “a shift on social, due largely to Jed and his team’s efforts” and concluded that the messages about sending negative content to “digital” are “inexplicable unless the Wayfarer Parties were spreading negative content about Lively.”

Then this: “It is fair to presume that the Wayfarer Parties did what they said that they planned to do.”

And finally, the sentence that should have ended the conversation: “A reader of those messages would have little doubt that the Wayfarer Parties engaged in a smear campaign.”

On the journalists?

The court found the Times “reviewed the available evidence and reported... what it believed to be true,” and that “it had evidence to support that narrative.”

The fair-report privilege protected the reporting on Lively’s complaint, and nothing suggested the Times doubted what the messages showed.

Judge Liman was ruling on the pleadings, not entering final judgment, but he was ruling on Wayfarer’s lawsuit, built on Wayfarer’s chosen allegations, with the texts they never disputed were real.

A New York state judge recently went further in the anti-SLAPP proceeding, finding the case against the Times “lacked a substantial basis in fact and law” and ordering Wayfarer to pay the paper $171,616.20.

Now, let’s look at the evidence that came out in discovery… claim by claim against the article we were told was a lie.

“You know we can bury anyone”

The article’s headline quote was always the flashpoint.

Doctored, we were told. Out of context.

Here is the context, from the crisis publicist Justin Baldoni hired, produced in discovery.

On August 2, 2024, four days before the premiere, Baldoni texted that he was “[n]ot in love with the document” his new crisis team had sent: “Not sure I’m feeling the protection I felt on the call.”

His publicist Jennifer Abel relayed to Nathan that Baldoni “wants to feel like she [Lively] can be buried.”

^{This post is free, but for subscribers only. If you've read this far, you know this case is about what coordinated online harassment can do to a person. I've received enough of it myself covering this lawsuit.}

Nathan’s replies, verbatim, timestamped:

“Of course- but you know when we send over documents we can’t send over the work we will or could do because that could get us in a lot of trouble.” (9:47 AM)

“We can’t write it down to him. We can’t write we will destroy her. We will go to this. We will do this. We will do this. We will do this.” (9:48 AM)

“Imagine if a document saying all the things that he wants ends up in the wrong hands.” (9:49 AM)

“you know we can bury anyone. But I can’t write that to him. I will, I’ll be very tough.” (9:50 AM)

And one line the Times never printed, from the same thread: “The work is not the document. The work is the f*ing crisis lol.”

Not doctored. Not paraphrased.

The next day, Wayfarer signed TAG's engagement letter (56.1 ¶ 693).

Then? They decided they needed MORE help.

“Most importantly untraceable”

The Times reported that Nathan floated proposals for “full social account take downs,” “threads of theories,” and work that would be “untraceable.” Two years of commentary called this a fantasy.

The August 5, 2024 text is now public (Dkt. 1230-66, JONESWORKS_00012745). Nathan sent Heath and Abel two quotes from “the two teams we use that get the best results”: $175,000 for “full reddit, full social account take downs, full social crisis team on hand for anything... start threads of theories”; $25,000 a month for “creation of social fan engagement to go back and forth with any negative accounts, helping to change the narrative.”

Then, in her words: “All of this will be most importantly untraceable.”

Discovery went further than the Times ever could.

On August 8, the digital team’s formal scope of work went to Wayfarer under the subject line “Social / Digital Mitigation / Remediation” (Dkt. 1233-58, Ex. 207).

Its stated premise: “The integral part here is to execute all without fingerprints.”

The itemized services included leveraging “relationships with Discord, Reddit, X, IG, TikTok, YouTube” to “expose behavior of Blake,” “CTR manipulation and contextual links to push up positive PR to change subject matter opinion on the first page of Google,” and “starting threads with theories the team approves of” (56.1 ¶ 720).

One of the “hired guns” himself, Jed Wallace of Street Relations, described his methods to other clients in texts produced from his files: “I need to be able to throw a ton of upvotes at stuff that is rah rah rah... and need to downvote everything else.”

“[I] have the various teams heavily clipping and algorithm boosting it for you.”

“[U]se our team of specialists to build all the digital (Reddit, site, X, 4 Chan, discord, etc) messaging to trend and dominate in client’s favor” (56.1 ¶ 722, Exs. 210–215).

On August 9, the day the film opened, Wayfarer wired Street Relations $30,000, (for one month) and Wallace confirmed his “team is/has been in full throttle mode on our Wayfarer focus!” (56.1 ¶ 735, Ex. 67).

Total paid through October: $90,000, with communications moved to Signal, the auto-deleting messaging app, at Wallace’s request (56.1 ¶¶ 762–764).

Justin Baldoni was also paying TAG $15,000 a month for crisis PR, AND Jennifer Abel for PR services.

“There was no smear campaign” apparently has an invoice trail.

“This is what we would need”

The Times reported that three days after the “bury” exchange, Baldoni flagged a social media thread accusing another celebrity of bullying (one that had racked up millions of views) and told his team: “This is what we would need.”

At his October 2025 deposition, Baldoni confirmed it.

The post he sent Abel was about “Hailey Bieber’s history of bullying many women.” His explanation: he “resonated with the word ‘bullying’” and claimed he never read the rest.

Abel’s reply, in the same thread: “Yes. I literally just spoke to Melissa about this on the break about what we discussed last night for social and digital.”

Then: “Focus on Reddit, TikTok, IG“ (Baldoni Dep. Tr., Oct. 6, 2025, at 262–273, Dkt. 1211-8).

Within two weeks, the Daily Mail was running “HOLLYWOOD VILLAIN,” branding Lively “a mean girl” who bullied other women; a piece TAG celebrated internally and routed to their digital fixer: “Omg this is amazing. We should send to Jed, right?” (56.1 ¶ 754).

Asked at deposition whether it was a coincidence that he’d asked for bullying articles and bullying articles then appeared, Baldoni answered that “the Internet dug up” the stories on its own.

“She’s ready when we are”

The Times reported Abel texting on August 4: "I'm having reckless thoughts of wanting to plant pieces this week of how horrible Blake is to work with," and Nathan replying that a Daily Mail editor was ready.

The record (Dkt. 1230-50, JONESWORKS_00016238–39): Nathan responded "same," said she had "already off the records Spoke to the editor [of the] Daily Mail because she's my friend," and, verbatim, "She's ready when we are."

Four days earlier, Abel had told Wayfarer she was at dinner with a writer for People, Fox News, In Touch, and Us Weekly who was "fully briefed of the situation and is armed and ready to take this story of Blake weaponizing feminism to any of her outlets the minute we give her the green light... hates Blake, has heard this story before, and will do anything for us. Just fyi :)" (56.1 ¶¶ 681–682, Ex. 49).

When negative coverage of Baldoni threatened anyway, the team killed it.

August 9, on the Daily Mail’s story: Abel to Nathan — I can “tell you’ve done a lot of work here,” because the article said nothing “about being unsafe[,] [f]at comments[,] sexual” (¶ 736).

Days later Abel bragged the Daily Mail had “reduced down” “Sexual predator” to “chauvinistic” (¶ 737).

When Page Six prepared a story, Nathan got the most inflammatory language removed by calling the reporter, her own sister (¶ 738).

When the Daily Mail came “hounding [Nathan] re HR complaints” on August 15, she redirected them to a piece about Lively copying Taylor Swift, chosen because it “looked organic and wouldn’t seem like we placed” it (¶ 755).

Then they celebrated, in an exchange now public in full (Dkt. 1233-72).

Abel: "So are we in the clear now?! Did we survive?!"

Nathan: "We survived." They had "confused people" with "[s]o much mixed messaging," which was "actually really funny if you think about it" — Baldoni would "not [be] cancelled."

Abel, later that night: "The narrative online is so freaking good and fans are still sticking up for Justin... I see this as a total success, as does Justin. You did such amazing work."

Nathan: "Narrative is CRAZY good[.] So did you."

“That’s all us lol”

The one thing the Times honestly couldn’t establish in December 2024 was attribution: how much of the online pile-on was organic, and how much was manufactured?

The article said it was “impossible to know.”

Discovery answered.

August 6, 2024: a TAG intern flags a social media comment defending Baldoni’s absence from press.

TAG vice president Katie Case replies: “Ok the comments are working excellent” and “Thats all us lol” (¶ 718).

August 9, 1:49 PM, Nathan forwards Abel a message from her digital fixer: “‘we are crushing it on Reddit’ — Jed” (Dkt. 1233-72).

August 9: a user posts that they don’t believe the reports about Baldoni — Case circulates it: “Thank the lord for Jed.”

Her colleague: “Thank god” (¶ 739).

Same day, on a comment suggesting Lively’s team planted the Daily Mail story: “Thank the lord for social and digital mitigation lol” (¶ 740).

August 10, TAG reports to Wayfarer’s CEO: “We’ve also started to see a shift on social, due largely to Jed and his team’s efforts to shift the narrative towards shining a spotlight on Blake and Ryan” (¶ 743).

And when Baldoni himself noticed accounts defending him that “feel like bots,”

Nathan reassured him: “I can fully fully confirm we do not have bots... The other team is doing something very specific in terms of what they do. I know Jamey & Jed connected on this” (¶ 760).

His reply: “Ok thank you,” with praying-hands and heart emojis (¶ 761).

Sony, a neutral party with every incentive to protect its movie, measured the result in real time: by August 13, online response was 89% pro-Baldoni and 4% pro-Lively (¶ 765, Ex. 190).

Three retained experts: a Tulane computer scientist, USC's marketing chair, and a Northwestern professor ALL INDEPENDENTLY found indications of coordinated inauthentic activity across TikTok, Reddit, and YouTube, with manufactured narratives absent from public conversation before August 2024 and surging after (¶¶ 830–841).

“Nothing proactive”

Remember the official denial, printed in the Times itself: Wayfarer and its representatives “did nothing proactive nor retaliated.”

The record includes: a Wayfarer-built opposition-research timeline on Lively with a tab titled “Zingers,” “focused on themes for attacking Lively’s reputation” (¶¶ 647–649); TAG pitching the Daily Mail’s Alison Boschoff a “hands off think piece” trashing Lively’s press tour, with Case adding “let’s bring in the fact that she promoted a haircare line and her drink brand” and Nathan approving “Yes. Let’s go,” which was then published August 20 as Lively’s “unmitigated disaster” (¶¶ 751–752).

The article came out. It was exactly as planned. Exactly as planted.

After Lively filed her complaint, Freedman personally assembling a group chat with Sage Steele, Sarowitz, Baldoni, Heath, Abel, and Nathan: “In order to use her, we need to start with a video that can go viral. That will get her in organically” (¶ 796).

Steele agreed to keep her script vague to “make it look organic / like I don’t have too much insider info” (¶ 799). Heath and Sarowitz gave notes on her drafts (¶¶ 799–800).

The video, “Shame on Blake Lively,” ran January 7, 2025, presented as independent journalism.

And the misconduct complaints themselves?

The commentary machine spent two years insisting Lively invented her on-set complaints in 2024 to seize the movie.

The record says the complaints were contemporaneous: from 2023, in real time, from multiple women.

May 24, 2023, mid-production, Lively texts a friend: “It’s like HR nuts today... I don’t want you[r] gaze or words or tongue or videos of your naked wife. Yeah. It’s shocking. Clowns” (¶ 555, Ex. 95).

Two days later she asks Sony about filing an HR complaint (¶ 560).

Her castmate Jenny Slate writes her agent that “Justin and Jamey are truly unfit,” that she feels “repulsed,” that it was “a really gross and disturbing shoot, and I’m one of many who feel th[i]s way” (¶¶ 563, 558).

A producer texts Sony: “I think we need to replace our director. And [Heath] should not be on set” (¶ 567).

Wayfarer's in-house counsel called Lively's requested protections "not only reasonable but also essential for the benefit of all parties involved," and the studio agreed to nearly all of them in writing, including the no-retaliation clause (¶ 583).

Baldoni, the morning after Lively read her complaint list aloud in January 2024, texted his friend group that "many of them were based in actual situations" (¶ 588, Wayfarer Ex. 121).

And no one at Wayfarer ever investigated any of it: Heath testified an investigation was never even discussed; Baldoni testified he was "not sure" he'd have wanted one "even if sexual harassment was being insinuated"; billionaire backer Steve Sarowitz saw no need because he doesn't believe Baldoni "is capable of sexually harassing anyone" (¶¶ 589, 578, 570).

The messages that were built to disappear

One more thing the deposition transcripts gave us that the Times never had.

The paper trail you’ve been reading above exists because these people texted freely in the summer of 2024, with one deliberate exception. From his very first conversations with Wayfarer in August 2024, Jed Wallace required that clients reach him on Signal, the encrypted app with disappearing messages: his standard practice for clients receiving his “digital services” (56.1 ¶¶ 763–764).

Heath, the CEO, readily obliged: “As for Signal, I’m not on it but will set that up this week for sure” (Ex. 236, STREET 1.000055).

The publicists texted each other on iMessage; the digital operation ran through the app built to leave nothing behind. Which is why the record is full of texts about Jed’s work, “Thank the lord for Jed,” “we are crushing it on Reddit”, and nearly silent on the work itself.

“Without fingerprints” wasn’t a metaphor. It was the infrastructure.

Then Lively filed her complaint, and the practice spread.

Baldoni testified under oath that after the lawsuits were filed in December 2024, he and the other defendants, together with their attorneys (he named Bryan Freedman), moved their group communications to Signal; that he understood the messages disappearing was “part of it”; and that he asked friends to text him “only on Signal.”

Asked about auto-deletion, he testified he set his threads “to whatever the Signal auto thing is”, while noting that “none of our legal threads auto delete,” and denying he ever manually deleted a message (Baldoni Dep. Tr., Oct. 6, 2025, at 62–70, Dkt. 1211-8).

Ask yourself two simple questions…

1. If the summer’s texts proved their innocence why did they disappear after a certain date?

2. And why, once the lawsuit landed, did everyone else’s follow?

The story was never about what you were told it was about

The part almost everyone got wrong, including, for two years, most of the content creators and press covering this case (though perhaps that was intentional)?

The coverage and the commentary flattened this into a he-said-she-said harassment fight: her word against his about what happened on set.

That framing was never the New York Times story, and it was never Blake Lively’s.

Go back and read the article the internet spent two years calling a hit piece. The headline is not about harassment, it’s “Inside a Hollywood Smear Machine.”

Its opening scene is not a film set, it’s Baldoni and Heath hiring a crisis PR expert.

The Times’ 18-minute audio version and its companion video are structured the same way: the on-set allegations occupy a few sentences of setup, and the entire investigation is the campaign that followed.

And Lively’s only quoted statement in that article says it in her words: “I hope that my legal action helps pull back the curtain on these sinister retaliatory tactics to harm people who speak up about misconduct and helps protect others who may be targeted.”

Not a word about winning a swearing contest over what happened during filming. From day one, she was pointing at the machine.

For two years, the loudest voices on the internet told you the receipts were fake. The receipts are now public, Bates-stamped, and sitting on a federal docket, and you can read every one of them yourself.

The New York Times article was not fake. It was just early.

Sources: Dkt. 1236-2 (Plaintiff’s Response to Defendants’ Rule 56.1 Statement and Plaintiffs’ Additional 56.1 Statement, with all paragraph citations above); public exhibits at Dkt. 1230-1–150 and 1233-1–159 (refiled Jan. 20, 2026 per Dkt. 1229); Baldoni Dep. Tr. (Oct. 6–7, 2025), Dkt. 1211-8; Opinion and Order, Apr. 2, 2026; Order dismissing Wayfarer’s amended complaint, June 9, 2025 (ECF 296); “’We Can Bury Anyone’: Inside a Hollywood Smear Machine,” N.Y. Times (Dec. 21, 2024).

© 2026 More with MJ. All rights reserved. This article may not be reproduced or republished in full without written permission. Quoting excerpts with attribution and a link to this post is welcome and encouraged. The court records cited and pictured are public documents filed in Lively v. Wayfarer Studios LLC, No. 24-cv-10049 (S.D.N.Y.), and may be shared freely, that's rather the point.

The writing below is a summary of the 30 minute audio.

On April 2, 2026, Judge Liman issued his summary judgment ruling in Blake Lively v. Justin Baldoni et al. You’re going to see headlines saying the sexual harassment claims were dismissed. What you won’t see is the part that matters: they were dismissed on legal technicalities. “When I say technicality, I mean threshold legal questions (employee status and geographic nexus) that prevented the court from ever reaching the merits. The harassment claims were not dismissed because a court found the conduct didn’t happen. They were dismissed because the law couldn’t reach it through those statutes for those reasons. That’s an important distinction.

I’m going to walk you through the actual decision — pull it up, here, because I want you to see this for yourself. I’m going to show you exactly what the court found, what it didn’t find, and why the difference matters.

What Was Actually in the Court’s Record

The factual record documents a pattern of boundary violations on set: a producer who promised Lively privacy while she was undressed and then watched her reflection in a mirror, pressure to film a near-nude birth scene without prior agreement or an intimacy coordinator present, unsolicited discussion of the director’s pornography addiction, and improvised physical contact during intimate scenes she had not consented to.

Lively responded by negotiating a formal contract rider (the CRA) that required an intimacy coordinator, prohibited sharing nude footage without her consent, banned further pornography discussions on set, and established clear physical boundaries. I want you to think about that list. Normal, safe workplaces don’t require protections like those in a legal document unless someone has given you reason to believe you need them.

The court found her complaints had a reasonable basis. Then it dismissed the harassment claims before ever weighing that evidence.

Why the Harassment Claims Were Dismissed

Title VII (federal law) only covers employees, not independent contractors. Because Lively had her own team, creative control, and negotiating power, the court classified her as a contractor. The more successful and accomplished you are as a woman in Hollywood, the less federal harassment law protects you. The very power she used to negotiate safety protections was turned against her to deny her legal recourse.

FEHA (California state law) does cover independent contractors for harassment, but only for conduct occurring in California. Most filming took place in New Jersey. So the federal law didn’t cover her job title, and the state law didn’t cover her location. The harassment evidence was never evaluated. Not once.

What’s Going to Trial

Three claims survived and are headed to a jury:

1. FEHA Retaliation — whether the coordinated campaign against Lively was illegal retaliation for reporting harassment

2. Aiding and Abetting Retaliation — against The Agency Group (TAG), the crisis PR firm that built and ran the campaign

3. Breach of the CRA — whether the safety protections she negotiated were violated

The Retaliation Campaign

This is the part that I find most disturbing. After Lively raised her concerns, Baldoni and Wayfarer Studios hired crisis PR. What followed was not reputation management. The court’s record includes texts from the PR firm saying “we can’t write ‘we will destroy her’ but you know we can bury anyone,” a financier saying “there will be two dead bodies when I’m done,” a formal strategy document recommending planted stories about the “weaponization of feminism,” and operatives texting “the comments are working excellent — that’s all us” — describing their methods as untraceable.

If what you are doing is legitimate, it does not need to be untraceable.

An expert analysis found the campaign generated 176 million negative impressions and drove a 30% increase in negative public sentiment toward Lively during the exact window the campaign ran. After starring in a box office hit, she received no meaningful career offers. That is what retaliation looks like in practice.

The court wrote: “It is fair to presume that the Wayfarer parties did what they said they planned to do.”

The Bottom Line

Justin Baldoni was not found innocent of sexual harassment. The court never ruled on whether the harassment occurred.

His lawyers successfully argued that a job title technicality and a state line on a map meant the claims had to be dismissed, and they were right, legally.

But the conduct was never adjudicated.

Not one dismissal involved a court finding that Lively’s account was wrong.

Blake Lively did everything right. She raised concerns. She documented them. She negotiated written protections. The response was a professionally managed campaign to destroy her, and it worked.

The case is not over. The most important claims are alive. The most damning evidence is going to a jury.

One quick point before we dive in. In the federal court system, trial judges have to follow the rulings of the appeals court above them. In New York, that appeals court is the Second Circuit. When the Second Circuit announces a legal rule, federal judges in New York are required to apply it.

With that, let’s get into it.

First: What Motion is He Talking About?

In this lawsuit, Baldoni’s team filed two motions trying to end the case before trial.

Before we get into this letter, you need to understand the difference between the two.

Motion #1: Judgment on the Pleadings (Rule 12(c) - the “MJOP”). This is the sneaky one. A motion for judgment on the pleadings is filed under Rule 12(c) of the Federal Rules of Civil Procedure. Instead of looking at the evidence, the court only looks at Lively’s original complaint, the piece of paper her lawyers filed at the beginning of the case.

No texts. No depositions. No “we can bury anyone.” No “social combat plan.” Just the pleadings.

The question is: did the complaint say enough words in the right order to state a valid legal claim? The legal standard is the same as a motion to dismiss under Rule 12(b)(6), the only difference is timing.

A 12(b)(6) motion is filed before the answer; a 12(c) motion is filed after an answer. Same standard, later in the case.

It is unusual to see a Rule 12(c) motion pressed after discovery and right before a summary judgment motion, which is what Justin Baldoni’s team did here.

Motion #2: Summary Judgment (Rule 56). This is the big one. The court looks at all the evidence (every text message, every deposition, every document produced in discovery that the two sides put before the court) and asks: is there enough here for a jury to decide? Both sides filed massive briefs and statements of facts on this. This motion is still pending.

See why a defendant might prefer Motion #1? If the evidence that came out in discovery sucks for you (and in this case, it kind of does) you’d much rather have the judge reading the complaint than reading your text messages or the deposition transcripts from witnesses.

Baldoni’s team filed their MJOP late (end of September). Discovery was already done (or should have been but for some of their issues). The summary judgment record was already compiled. And they asked the court to ignore all of it and go back to evaluating the complaint.

Lively’s lawyers said: that’s the wrong question at this stage of the case.

The defendants replied: too bad, the complaint is deficient on its face.

All of this was briefly touched upon in front of Judge Liman on January 22, 2026 (when the lawyers argued the summary judgment motion). He hasn’t ruled yet.

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Wait a second… can Lawyers Just File Letters Like This?

Yes. This is completely normal and, frankly, expected.

When a new court decision comes out that is directly relevant to a pending motion, lawyers have an obligation to bring it to the court’s attention. It’s called a “notice of supplemental authority.”

Judges are busy. They have hundreds of cases. When a binding appellate decision comes down that speaks directly to an issue the judge is actively considering, the responsible thing (and in some jurisdictions, the required thing) is to flag it immediately.

That’s what Gottlieb did. He didn’t file a new brief. He didn’t reargue the motion. He wrote a short letter saying: this new decision exists, here’s what it holds, and here’s why it controls the pending motion. Courts receive letters like this routinely. There is nothing unusual, aggressive, or improper about it. It’s… clever lawyering 😉.

Contrary to what you may see circulating online, nothing in the filing misrepresents the case.

A notice of supplemental authority alerts the court to a new appellate decision issued while motions are pending. Miller v. Lamanna addresses the procedural issue of reverting to the pleading standard after discovery and ignoring the evidentiary record. Whether that reasoning ultimately applies to the motion here is for Judge Liman to decide… which is exactly why lawyers notify the court when relevant precedent comes out.

Courts receive letters like this routinely. There is nothing unusual, aggressive, or improper about it.

What Just Happened

On March 9, 2026, three days ago, the Second Circuit (that’s the federal appeals court that controls all federal courts in New York, including SDNY /Judge Liman’s court) issued a ruling in a completely unrelated case called Miller v. Lamanna.

In Miller, a similar (but not identical) thing happened.

After two years of discovery, the defendants asked the court to throw out the case. Instead of evaluating the actual evidence, the trial court went back to the complaint and said: your complaint doesn’t say enough.

Case dismissed.

All that discovery? Ignored.

The plaintiff appealed. And the Second Circuit reversed.

What the Majority Actually Said

I’m going to walk through the majority opinion directly (you can read it here), because people on the internet are going to tell you this case doesn’t apply to the Lively MJOP.

That interpretation misses the broader reasoning of the opinion.

Here’s why.

The majority held that reverting to the pleading standard after discovery can be procedural error. The court explained that this kind of move,which it calls a “reverse Rule 12(d) conversion” “disregard[s] the more robust procedural device the parties have invoked to frame the issue and thus unjustifiably ignore[s] the fuller evidentiary record” that the parties invested significant time and resources to develop. Miller, 2026 WL 643744, at *16:

The majority wrote that the pleading standard is a screening tool for the early stages of a case not for post-discovery litigation. The court said the pleading standard “acts as a screening mechanism in the early stages of litigation,” requiring a complaint to “allege sufficient facts to raise a reasonable expectation that discovery will reveal evidence of the defendant’s wrongdoing.”

But, and this is the key, “once the parties have already incurred the expense of discovery, that objective becomes inapposite.” Id. at *16-17.

Let me translate “inapposite” for you: it means it doesn’t apply anymore.

The whole point of the pleading standard is to decide whether discovery should happen.

Once discovery already happened, asking whether the complaint justified discovery is a meaningless question.

The majority suggested that where discovery evidence fills gaps in the complaint, dismissing based solely on pleading deficiencies becomes difficult to justify.

The court explained that if the summary judgment record shows the plaintiff has raised sufficient evidence, “dismissing the case based on pleading deficiencies in the complaint’s factual allegations seems difficult to justify because the fruits of discovery would have revealed that the pleading deficiency is curable.” Id. at *17-18.

The court also pointed out that filing a pleading challenge this late in the case compounds the risk of error, if defendants had challenged the complaint earlier, any deficiencies “presumably could have been cured before the allotted time to amend the pleadings expired.” Id. at *18.

The majority explicitly stated that its reasoning is not limited to standing cases. This matters because some people will try to tell you that the earlier case this builds on (Lugo v. City of Troy) only applies to Article III standing challenges, not to the sufficiency of pleadings generally. The majority directly addresses and rejects that argument. The court said: “Nothing in Lugo suggests that our reasoning was specific to cases in which the issue on which summary judgment or dismissal was sought involved standing.” Id. at *22. The court went further: the reasoning in Lugo “relied on the standard for granting summary judgment on any ‘claim or defense, including on standing’”. Id.

And then the majority dropped this passage in a footnote, which is worth reading carefully:

“the question here is not about what burden the plaintiff bears to avoid summary judgment — plaintiff agrees that he must now do more than allege facts that render his claim plausible, by adducing evidence sufficient to raise genuine issues of fact, and contends that he can and does carry that burden — but rather about whether the defendant can ignore the evidence to which plaintiff points and win the case by reverting to the pleading stage, obtaining a dismissal because the complaint was, as a matter of pleading, insufficient.“ Id. at *22-23.

Read that again.

The Second Circuit is describing (in pretty exact terms) what Baldoni’s team tried to do with their MJOP.

The majority held that this applies a fortiori to challenges on the merits, not just standing. The court reasoned that if Lugo required evidence-based analysis even for standing (which is a jurisdictional, constitutional requirement), then “it should follow a fortiori that, as to a pleading defect going to the merits . . . if the plaintiff can now bear the heavier burden imposed at the summary judgment stage, the court cannot ignore the actual evidence and dismiss a case that must be tried because, in hindsight as a result of evidence ascertained during discovery, the plaintiff’s complaint has become conclusory.” Id. at *23.

And then this line: “While a complaint’s allegations are, absent amendment, frozen in time, a plaintiff’s claims are not.“ Id

Lastly, the majority also addressed a point that is directly relevant here.

It explained that even if the defendants had formally brought their challenge as a Rule 12(c) motion, dismissal still would not have been appropriate where the factual record is disputed.

The court wrote that:

“where a question of fact is in dispute, it is improper for the district court to answer it on a motion for dismissal on the pleadings.”

And it went further, explaining that once discovery has occurred:

courts do not treat the pleading standard as requiring dismissal if “evidence that had already been produced during discovery would fill the perceived gaps in the complaint.”

In other words, even if a complaint was thin on paper, evidence developed in discovery can cure those deficiencies, and courts cannot ignore that record when evaluating the claims…

That’s the Second Circuit saying courts evaluate claims based on the evidence that exists now, not just the complaint as it was written at the beginning.

“But What About the Dissent?”

Yes, there’s a dissent. Circuit Judge Sullivan wrote it, and it’s a serious textualist argument. He says Rule 12(c) of the Federal Rules expressly allows a motion for judgment on the pleadings at any time after the pleadings are closed, and that the majority is rewriting the rules based on abstract efficiency concerns. He cites cases where post-discovery 12(c) motions were granted and affirmed. He cites the Supreme Court.

It’s a real argument. He’s not wrong about what Rule 12(c) says on its face.

But he lost. It’s the dissent.

The majority controls. And the majority said (directly, explicitly, in language that could not be clearer) that reverting to the pleading standard after discovery while ignoring the evidentiary record can be procedural error. That’s now binding Second Circuit precedent.

Why This (Might) Kill Baldoni’s MJOP

The situation in Lively v. Wayfarer is what the majority opinion describes. Not analogous. Not similar. It is the thing itself.

Baldoni’s team filed a motion for judgment on the pleadings. They did it after months of discovery. They did it less than two months before filing a summary judgment motion supported by a massive evidentiary record. They asked Judge Liman to evaluate Lively’s claims based only on the complaint, ignoring the evidence to which plaintiff points and reverting to the pleading stage. That is the exact conduct the Second Circuit held was procedural error.

Let me preempt the counterarguments you’ll see online:

“Miller is about a converted motion, not a standalone 12(c) motion.”

Wrong. The majority’s reasoning is not about how the motion was labeled. It’s about the fundamental problem of applying the pleading standard after discovery. The majority said the pleading standard “becomes inapposite” once discovery has occurred. It said its reasoning applies to any “claim or defense,” not just standing. It said courts “cannot ignore the actual evidence and dismiss a case that must be tried.” None of that reasoning turns on how the motion was captioned.

“Lugo was about standing, so Miller only applies to standing.”

The majority explicitly rejected this. “Nothing in Lugo suggests that our reasoning was specific to cases involving standing.” The court held that its reasoning applies a fortiori — meaning even more strongly — to challenges on the merits.

“Rule 12(c) says you can file these motions anytime.”

That’s Sullivan’s dissent. It’s the losing side. The majority acknowledged the text of the Rules and held that the procedural error analysis overrides the timing question. You can disagree with the majority. But Judge Liman can’t. He’s bound by it.

“The defendants in Miller didn’t file a separate 12(c) motion.”

That makes the Lively MJOP worse, not better. In Miller, the pleading challenge was embedded inside a summary judgment motion. Here, the defendants filed a standalone Rule 12(c) motion after discovery (but for their own discovery deficiencies) while pursuing summary judgment just weeks later. If anything, that raises the same concern the Second Circuit identified: reverting to the pleading stage while a full evidentiary record already exists.

The Letter

Michael Gottlieb (one of Lively’s lawyer’s at Willkie Farr) filed a one-page letter today (Doc. 1262) making exactly this point.

He didn’t write a long brief.

He didn’t rehash old arguments.

He pointed to Miller, pointed to Lively’s earlier opposition where she already made this argument, and said: this new decision compels denial of the MJOP.

One page. One case. Done.

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SO. What Happens to Those Issues?

The MJOP targeted five specific issues… things like whether California employment law can reach a New Jersey film set, whether the defamation claims are legally sufficient, and whether Lively properly exhausted her administrative remedies.

Those issues don’t disappear. They just get evaluated against the evidence instead of the complaint. And that’s worse for the defendants.

On extraterritoriality (their best argument): instead of just reading the complaint, the court would now consider evidence that Wayfarer is headquartered in California, that the crisis PR campaign was run from California, that the contract has a California choice-of-law provision, and that the defendants themselves filed California-law claims. That last part creates a potential estoppel problem. Hard to invoke California law when it helps you and then argue it doesn’t apply when it doesn’t.

On the defamation defenses: instead of just reading the complaint, the court now sees the actual texts about the “social combat plan,” TAG’s scope of work, and the gap between what Bryan Freedman publicly said (”we did nothing proactive”) and what the record shows actually happened.

On adverse employment action: the complaint might have been thin on this point. The evidence is not.

The Bottom Line?

The MJOP was a tactical play. Baldoni’s team wanted the court to evaluate Lively’s claims on a standard that would let the judge ignore all the bad evidence.

Three days ago, the Second Circuit ruled (in binding precedent) that reverting to the pleading standard after discovery can be procedural error. The pleading standard “becomes inapposite” once the parties have incurred the expense of discovery. Courts cannot ignore the evidence and revert to the pleading stage. And as the court put it: while a complaint’s allegations may be frozen in time, a plaintiff’s claims are not.

Gottlieb’s letter is the kind of filing lawyers love. A new authority that does your work for you, dropped in your lap at exactly the right moment.

The MJOP might be dead.

Lively v. Wayfarer Studios LLC, et al., No. 24-cv-10049 (S.D.N.Y.). Supplemental authority letter filed March 12, 2026, Doc. 1262.

Miller v. Lamanna, No. 24-2314, 2026 WL 643744 (2d Cir. Mar. 9, 2026). Full opinion (PDF).

The views expressed in this post are my own opinions based on publicly available court filings and documents as of February 2026. I am not involved in this case and have no access to non-public information, sealed filings, or privileged communications. This analysis could change as new documents are released or additional information becomes public. All case law has been linked for those who would like extra reading.

This is Part Four in a series breaking down summary judgment in the Blake Lively v. Justin Baldoni case. Part one (the standard, is available here); part two (the Judge, is available here); part three (the facts, is available here).

Baldoni’s motion for summary judgment is available here and Lively’s response is available here.

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PART 1: What This Fight Is About

On November 12, 2025, Justin Baldoni (and team) filed a motion asking Judge Lewis Liman to grant summary judgment, essentially asking the judge to rule in his favor without ever letting a jury hear Blake Lively’s sexual harassment claims.

This is a critical moment in any case.

Summary judgment is the last chance to end a lawsuit before trial (absent a settlement).

Unlike a motion to dismiss (where the judge assumes everything the non-moving party says is true - the moment in this case where Justin Baldoni’s claims were tossed), at summary judgment the judge actually looks at the evidence both sides have gathered during discovery.

The question now is:

Based on the actual evidence documents, texts, emails, recordings, film clips, contracts, and depositions, is there a genuine dispute of fact that a jury needs to resolve?

Or is the law so clearly on one side’s favor that a trial would be a waste of time?

If Judge Liman grants summary judgment for Baldoni, Blake’s harassment claims are over. If he denies it, the case goes to trial.

Baldoni moved for summary judgment on all of Blake Lively’s claims. This post will only discuss the sexual harassment claims.

I note for the Substack/Internet record that Blake Lively never alleged sexual assault. These claims have always been workplace harassment claims under federal and California law. There is no “changed theory” here. That is misinformation.

What Blake Has to Prove

Blake’s workplace harassment claims are brought under both federal law (Title VII) and California state law (FEHA). The claims this post will discuss? As per the above:

• First: Sexual Harassment in Violation of Title VII, 42 U.S.C. § 2000e-2(a)(1)

• Third: Sexual Harassment in Violation of FEHA – Cal. Gov. Code, § 12940

• Sixth: Failure to Investigate, Prevent, and/or Remedy Harassment in Violation of FEHA – Cal. Gov. Code., § 12940

• Seventh: Aiding and Abetting Harassment and Retaliation in Violation of FEHA – Cal. Gov. Code, § 12940(i))

• Thirteenth: Sexual Harassment in Violation of California Civil Code – Civ. Code, § 51.9

For Lively to defeat summary judgment and get to a jury, she doesn’t have to prove harassment yet, but she does have to show there’s a genuine factual dispute about a few key legal elements.

First: the conduct was “severe or pervasive.”
This is the hostile-work-environment test for sexual harassment. The conduct has to be bad enough, because of how serious it was, how often it happened, or both, that it altered the conditions of her work. Not just awkward, not just unprofessional. Something that, viewed in context, actually changed the working environment. Courts look at the totality of circumstances, frequency, severity, whether the conduct was humiliating or threatening, and whether it interfered with her work

Second: it happened “because of sex.”
This doesn’t mean the conduct was merely sexual in tone. It means the treatment was sex-based/directed at her because she is a woman, or that women were exposed to disadvantageous working conditions that men were not. Courts ask whether the conduct reflects gender-based targeting, hostility, or unequal treatment, not just whether sex was discussed. Yes, this is sexual harassment in the workplace context.

Third: who had power, and how that power was used.
Supervisor status does not determine whether harassment occurred, but it matters enormously for employer liability. If a supervisor harasses an employee, the company faces far greater exposure, especially if the conduct results in tangible job consequences. Blake argues Baldoni and Heath functioned as supervisors with consolidated power over the production (as lead actor, director, producer, and executives) which, if proven, limits the defenses available.

Reminder: The Standard at Summary Judgment: Is There a Real Dispute?

This is where summary judgment is different from a motion to dismiss. For a full discussion of the standard you can read this post.

The judge now looks at the actual evidence. Texts. Emails. Deposition testimony. Documents. Not just allegations in a complaint. Actual proof.

The important part?

The judge still views all evidence in the light most favorable to Blake.

If there’s a genuine dispute about what happened, or why it happened, or what it meant, that dispute goes to a jury.

Why These Claims Are “Rarely Appropriate” for Summary Judgment

Courts have repeatedly said that workplace harassment cases are uniquely unsuited for summary judgment.

Why? Because these type of claims turn on questions that juries are supposed to answer:

• Credibility - Who’s telling the truth? Was Baldoni joking or serious? Was Lively actually uncomfortable or just pretending?

• Intent - Why did Heath enter her trailer? Why did Baldoni discuss his orgasms? Was it work-related or personal? Also, intent does not always matter in this context (it does not in New York state).

• Context - How should we interpret these incidents? What did they mean in the moment?

• Severity - How bad was this, really? Did it actually change the working conditions?

A judge sitting in chambers reading transcripts can’t (usually) answer these questions.

That’s what trials are for. That’s what juries are for.

So Baldoni needs to convince Judge Liman that even viewing all the evidence in Lively’s favor, no reasonable jury could possibly find this was severe or pervasive harassment because of her sex.

So let’s get into how he tried to do so.

How We’re Going to Break This Down

For each legal element, I’ll lay out Justin Baldoni’s argument first, because at summary judgment, the moving party bears the initial burden.

Then I’ll walk through Blake Lively’s response, what evidence she points to, and why she says a jury, not a judge, should decide how that evidence is interpreted.

This matters, because summary judgment isn’t about who has the better story. It’s about whether the law allows the judge to take that decision away from a jury entirely.

So, remember, for each section, the question is the same:

Viewing the evidence in the light most favorable to Blake, is there a real factual dispute here, or not?

That’s the lens Judge Liman is required to use. With that in mind, let’s start where Baldoni does.

PART 2: THE FIGHT

a. The Openers: Baldoni vs. Lively

i. Baldoni’s Framing

“This is not actionable sexual harassment. Full stop.”

Baldoni opens by anchoring everything to one idea: context.

He then cites a decision written by Judge Liman (McSweeney). A very solid legal play. In McSweeney v. Cohen (decided months ago), Judge Liman ruled on sexual harassment claims by a Real Housewives cast member against Andy Cohen and Bravo. He held that comments about breast implants and calling someone a 'Housewife' were offensive but not actionable, in the context of reality TV. But he also held that off-camera harassment and coaching cast members to taunt someone was actionable. That distinction matters here.

Baldoni’s argument starts with the premise that you cannot evaluate what happened on this set the same way you would evaluate conduct in a typical office. This wasn’t an insurance company or a corporate boardroom. It was the set of a film centered on adult relationships, intimacy, and sexuality, based on a book known for explicit themes.

From there, he narrows the lens aggressively.

He characterizes Lively’s allegations as a “handful of comments and miscommunications” and argues that, when viewed in the context of a sexually charged creative environment, no reasonable juror could conclude that this conduct amounted to sexual harassment under the law.

That framing does a lot of work for him before the Court ever reaches the individual incidents.

ii. Lively’s Framing

“This is exactly the kind of case juries are meant to decide.”

Lively’s response opens from the opposite direction.

She does not dispute that context matters, instead, she argues that context is precisely why summary judgment is inappropriate.

Her brief starts by reminding the Court what sexual harassment law actually covers. Harassment is not limited to physical assault or overt threats. It includes verbal, physical, and visual conduct that communicates a demeaning or intrusive message, and that disrupts an employee’s emotional well-being, interferes with their ability to work, or undermines their sense of safety in the workplace.

She then widens the lens that Baldoni tries to narrow.

Rather than isolating each incident, she emphasizes the totality of the circumstances, explains how the conduct accumulated, how it landed, and how it affected her working conditions. Under California law in particular, even a single incident can be enough to create a hostile work environment if it is sufficiently severe.

Most importantly, she challenges the procedural move itself.

Hostile work environment claims, she argues, are “rarely appropriate” for summary judgment because they turn on questions that cannot be resolved on paper: intent, credibility, context, and impact. These are not abstract legal questions, they are factual disputes that juries exist to resolve.

Next, both sides drill into whether the alleged conduct was severe or pervasive enough to matter under the law.

b. Severe or Pervasive?

i. Baldoni’s Argument

This is not harassment. It’s discomfort.

Baldoni’s position is intentionally narrow and unsentimental. Harassment law, he says, does not exist to remedy awkward moments, creative tension, or things someone later wishes had gone differently.

The Supreme Court has said more than once that Title VII and its state-law counterparts are not “general civility codes” (Burlington Northern). Harassment must be objectively severe or pervasive, meaning a reasonable person would view the workplace as hostile or abusive, not just uncomfortable (Oncale).

That framing matters, because Baldoni characterizes Lively’s allegations as exactly what courts routinely dismiss: a collection of isolated, low-level incidents that sound bad when listed, but don’t meet the legal threshold when viewed in context (Alfano).

So he zooms way in on what (he says) actually happened, and what (he says) did not.

According to Baldoni, the core conduct Lively relies on includes things like:

• Using the word “sexy” twice to describe wardrobe during the filming of intimate scenes

• Doing so on set, while working, surrounded by cast and crew, without flirting, staring, or sexual tone

• Video footage showing Lively fully covered, in an oversized fleece onesie, not exposed or objectified

• An apology after Lively later expressed discomfort, which she responded to with “All good”

He then layers in the broader context courts care about (Morgan) by explaining that this was a film built around adult intimacy. Sony executives were actively pushing for more sexual “heat.” He says Lively herself used the word “sexy,” advocated for sexier wardrobe choices, and approved unscripted intimacy in scenes, including kissing Baldoni.

From his perspective, this matters because courts have dismissed harassment claims involving conduct that sounds much worse than this.

He cites case after case where supervisors:

• Commented on employees’ bodies

• Blew kisses

• Made sexual jokes

• Sent inappropriate emails

• Made repeated remarks about appearance

And courts still said: not severe enough, not pervasive enough, not actionable.

He also relies heavily on creative workplace cases, especially Lyle v. Warner Bros., where the California Supreme Court held that even graphic sexual talk in a writers’ room for an adult comedy show was not harassment unless it was directed at the plaintiff because of sex.

And he underscores that point with Judge Liman’s own decision in McSweeney, where he explained that comments that would be offensive in a normal office can land differently in entertainment settings, and even “obnoxious and insensitive” behavior can still be legally trivial.

Baldoni’s bottom line is blunt:

Courts have thrown out cases involving conduct far more explicit than this. If those don’t clear the “severe or pervasive” bar, this doesn’t either.

ii. Lively’s Response

You don’t get to bleach harassment by calling it “banal.”

Lively’s response is not polite about this.

She argues that Baldoni is doing exactly what courts have warned against for decades: atomizing harassment into harmless-sounding fragments, minimizing each one, and then declaring the whole thing trivial on paper (Nazir).

Harassment law doesn’t ask whether each moment, standing alone, sounds catastrophic.

It asks whether, viewed as a whole, the conduct intruded on someone’s dignity, emotional safety, and ability to do their job (Morgan, Rasmy).

And her team says, under California law, that bar is intentionally broader.

The Legislature has explicitly rejected efforts to narrow harassment claims and made clear that even a single incident can be enough if it is sufficiently severe (Gov. Code § 12923; Bailey). Courts have echoed that point repeatedly, including in the Second Circuit (Aulicino).

So Lively pushes back hard on Baldoni’s “banality” framing by putting specific conduct back into the picture, not sanitized, not euphemized

• She alleges that Baldoni didn’t just describe wardrobe. He gestured toward her breasts and described her as “sexy” when she was not in costume.

• She alleges he discussed his personal sexual preferences, including his marital preference for simultaneous orgasm, and asked whether she and her husband did the same.

• She alleges he disclosed (unprompted and unrelated to any scene) that he had previously “forced himself on women” without consent.

• She alleges repeated discussions of pornography, and Baldoni disclosing to the entire cast and crew that Lively had not seen pornography, even though the film does not depict or require discussion of pornography.

• She alleges he proposed adding gratuitous sexual content and nudity that would require additional physical contact, outside the script and without consent.

And then there is Heath.

Lively argues that two incidents involving Heath alone are enough to defeat summary judgment:

• Heath entering her private hair-and-makeup trailer while she was topless, wearing only a thong, and looking at her exposed breasts

• Heath showing her a nude video of his wife giving birth at work, after the birth scene in the film had already been completed

Under California law, she argues, these are not “awkward moments.” They are degrading, humiliating intrusions by a supervisor, and a reasonable jury could easily find them severe enough on their own (Bailey).

This is where she directly confronts the “creative context” defense.

Yes, she agreed to act in a romantic drama. That does not mean she consented to:

• Personal sexual disclosures

• Discussions of pornography unrelated to the work

• Improvised sexual content

• Physical or visual intrusions in private, non-work settings

Creative context, she argues, is not a free pass.

Women do not lose workplace protections because they work in entertainment (Gov. Code § 12923(d)).

As Lively puts it in her brief, hostile work environment claims are “rarely appropriate for disposition on summary judgment” because they involve issues “not determinable on paper.”

That’s the point. This isn’t about sanitizing conduct into bullet points. It’s about whether a jury gets to hear what actually happened.

Her answer is no.

That question belongs to a jury.

c. “Because of Sex” Is This Gendered, or Just Sexual?

This is Baldoni’s second major choke point.

Even if the conduct was uncomfortable.
Even if it crossed boundaries.
Even if it shouldn’t have happened.

He argues that none of it was because Blake Lively is a woman, and without that, the harassment claims fail as a matter of law.

i. Baldoni’s Argument

Sexual content is not the same thing as sex-based harassment.

Baldoni says to sustain a workplace harassment claim, Lively has to show that she was treated a certain way because she is a woman, not simply because sexual topics came up at work. The Supreme Court has been explicit about this: the key question is whether one sex is exposed to disadvantageous conditions that the other is not (Harris; Galdieri-Ambrosini).

From there, he reframes nearly every allegation as facially gender-neutral.

Take the hugging. Lively says there was too much of it. Baldoni says: fine, but hugging wasn’t directed at women. Video footage shows men and women hugging each other on set. If everyone was hugged, then no one was singled out because of gender.

Under Second Circuit law, conduct that is sex-neutral on its face does not become harassment just because it made someone uncomfortable (Lewis v. City of Norwalk).

Then he moves to the sexual conversations.

Baldoni argues that discussions of sexuality, consent, and pornography were not gender-motivated, they were work-related conversations between co-leads collaborating on a film about adult intimacy. He emphasizes that he speaks openly about these topics to men and women alike, including in books and on his podcast. No evidence, he says, shows he singled Lively out because she’s a woman.

He reinforces this by pointing to the broader set culture:

• Female cast and crew commented on the appearance of both men and women

• A female Sony executive encouraged Baldoni to include “as much tasteful hot sex as you can”

• Lively herself advocated for making her wardrobe sexier

• She explained to male crew members why her boots were “sexy”

• She oversaw unscripted intimacy, including kissing Baldoni

Against that backdrop, Baldoni argues, sporadic references to sex cannot plausibly be framed as gender-based targeting.

He applies the same logic to Heath.

The nude birth video, Baldoni says, was not shown because Lively is a woman, it was shown because she had just acted in a major birth scene and was discussing it. Heath showed the same video to Baldoni.

The trailer incident, Baldoni argues, also lacks gender motive. Even crediting Lively’s account, he says there’s no evidence Heath entered the trailer “for some untoward sexual reason.” He highlights that Lively herself told Heath at the time: “I know you weren’t trying to cop a look.”

Then Baldoni cites to case law where Courts have dismissed harassment claims involving far more explicit sexual conduct when (he says) plaintiffs couldn’t show it was motivated by gender:

• In Brown v. Henderson, coworkers joked about an affair, threatened to sodomize one another, and posted pornography, still not actionable without proof the conduct was because the plaintiff was a woman.

• In Bliss v. MXK, a bartender was exposed to nudity, prostitution, and sex acts, again, he says, dismissed because the conduct wasn’t directed at her as a woman.

• And most importantly, Lyle v. Warner Bros.: male writers pantomimed masturbation, bragged about sexual exploits, and made graphic comments, yet the California Supreme Court still reinstated summary judgment because both men and women engaged in the behavior and it wasn’t aimed at the plaintiff because of sex.

Baldoni’s bottom line here is:

Not every unwelcome sexual reference is gender discrimination.
And if conduct far more graphic than this wasn’t “because of sex,” then this isn’t either.

ii. Lively’s Counter

This wasn’t “sex in the air.” It was gendered conduct, directed at women, by people with power.

Baldoni’s argument on this element is deceptively simple: sexual content isn’t the same thing as sex-based harassment. And he’s right, sometimes. Courts have said that explicitly sexual behavior isn’t actionable unless it’s because of sex.

But Lively’s response is that Baldoni is relying on the wrong kind of cases, and flattening what actually happened on this set.

She starts with the legal standard Baldoni glosses over.

She says courts don’t require harassment to be shouted, slur-based, or explicitly announced as misogyny. Hostility does not need to be directly targeted at the plaintiff to matter, and it doesn’t need to be motivated by sexual desire. What matters is the totality of the circumstances, including culture, power, and impact.

That’s why courts allow “me too” evidence (testimony from other women) to show motive, intent, and gendered environment (Meeks v. AutoZone; Pantoja v. Anton). And it’s why courts look at whether conduct made it more difficult for the plaintiff to do her job, not whether the defendant insists it was harmless (Reynaga; Rasmy v. Marriott).

Lively argues that when you apply that standard here, Baldoni’s “this wasn’t about gender” framing falls apart.

This wasn’t one woman being unusually sensitive in an otherwise neutral workplace. Multiple women (Blake Lively, Jenny Slate, Saks, Ferrer, Hoover, and Hall) testified that they felt marginalized, disrespected, threatened, or objectified on this set.

The defendants don’t actually deny that most of the conduct occurred.

Instead, they relabel it as a “litany of minor grievances” and justify it by pointing to the film’s “sexually charged” subject matter.

Lively says that move is legally wrong.

California law is explicit on this point:

That language comes straight from California Government Code § 12923(d) enacted to stop courts from watering down harassment claims just because the workplace is creative, informal, or adult-themed.

Yes, Lively says, context matters. But “creative context” only matters when the sexual conduct is integral to job duties, not when it becomes personal, intrusive, or supervisory.

Lively also directly rebuts (in footnotes) the attempt to weaponize her own words and conduct against her.

Calling boots “sexy,” agreeing to romantic dialogue, or acting in a romantic drama does not mean she consented to:

• Personal sexual disclosures

• Discussions of pornography

• Improvised sexual content

• Physical or visual intrusions unrelated to the work

Consent to perform is not consent to be personally sexualized.

Finally, she brings the analysis back to power.

She says, on this set, Baldoni and Heath were not peers. They were her bosses, with consolidated authority as lead actor, director, producer, co-chairman, president, and CEO. They controlled her schedule, pay, daily working conditions, and the response to HR concerns.

Their closeness, their dismissal of complaints as “silly,” and their ability to act with impunity mattered.

So did the response of their close associate, who suggested reminding Lively “whose money it was.”

Sometimes workplace harassment shows up in who is intruded on. Who is dismissed. And who is expected to absorb discomfort so the work can continue. And that is why, Lively argues, this is not something a court should decide on paper.

d. Did Wayfarer Fix the Problem or Does Fixing It Not Matter?

This is where the parties are no longer arguing about what happened, but about what the law does with it.

i. Baldoni’s Argument: We Remediated - The End.

Baldoni’s position here is simple and unapologetic:

He argues that a hostile work environment claim fails if the employer responds promptly and effectively. In his telling:

• When Lively raised concerns, they were taken seriously.

• Boundaries and “protections” were put in place.

• Filming resumed without further incident.

• No additional misconduct occurred after the June 1, 2023 meeting.

• Lively herself later described the set as “perfectly professional and sterile and lovely.”

• Her agent and studio executives observed that she appeared positive and comfortable during the final phase of production.

He relies heavily on case law holding that a workplace cannot be deemed “pervasively hostile” if the employer actively intervenes and stops the complained-of behavior. He also points to the fact that one of Lively’s co-stars, Jenny Slate, declined to join the lawsuit, explaining that she felt her issues had been resolved and wanted to move on.

The takeaway Baldoni wants the court to accept is that she doesn’t get to call something “pervasive harassment” when the employer steps in, fixes it, and the work continues without issue.

In his view, that’s exactly what happened here, and that should end the case.

ii. Lively’s Response: That Defense Doesn’t Apply to Supervisors

Lively’s response is not subtle, and it’s not about whether conversations were had or whether filming resumed.

It’s about who did the conduct.

Her argument starts with a threshold legal point: Baldoni and Heath were not peers. On the set of the film, they were her supervisors, with consolidated power over her schedule, pay, daily working conditions, and access to decision-makers.

And that matters, because under both federal and California law:

When harassment is committed by supervisors, the employer is strictly liable.

In other words, Lively argues that Wayfarer cannot escape liability by pointing to remediation at all.

She goes further:

• Wayfarer had anti-harassment policies on paper, but failed to enforce them.

• No formal investigation was conducted.

• No disciplinary action was taken, not even an admonishment.

• Complaints were minimized, reframed as misunderstandings, or brushed off as “silly.”

• Internal communications acknowledged the conduct was being perceived as unsafe or sexually inappropriate, yet nothing followed.

From Lively’s perspective, her efforts to stabilize the set and keep production moving do not absolve the employer. They underscore the power imbalance. She argues that she bore the burden of managing the situation while the company failed to meet its legal obligations.

She also contends that the story didn’t end when filming resumed. According to her brief, retaliatory behavior, defensiveness, and disparagement continued afterward , which she says extended and exacerbated the hostile environment rather than curing it.

PART 3: THOUGHTS

This post ended up at least 3X longer than I intended, so there will need to be a part two.

Here’s one last (annoying) reminder that matters here.

At summary judgment, courts are not allowed to:

• weigh credibility,

• decide whose version is more believable,

• or resolve competing interpretations of the same facts.

If two reasonable jurors could look at the same evidence and come to different conclusions, summary judgment is supposed to be denied, even if the judge personally finds one side more convincing.

That’s why courts routinely say hostile work environment claims are “rarely appropriate” for resolution on summary judgment. These claims live and die on context, power dynamics, and lived impact, things that don’t translate cleanly to paper.

Which means this case doesn’t turn on whether you believe Blake Lively.

So with that in mind:

Based on what you now know about the summary judgment standard,
and based on the arguments both sides are actually making…

• Do you think there are genuine disputes of fact here?

• Do you think reasonable jurors could disagree?

• Or do you think the law compels the Court to end this case now?

That’s the decision Judge Liman has to make.

Following Along

This is Part Four in an ongoing series covering the summary judgment battle in Lively v. Baldoni.

Coming up next? More claim-by-claim analysis.

Why?

This case sits at the intersection of employment law, entertainment industry practices, and how courts handle power imbalances in creative workplaces.

It matters far beyond Hollywood, because the legal standards being argued here apply to every workplace in America.

If you have questions, drop them in the comments.

If there’s confusion about the legal standard, the evidence, or how courts actually decide these cases, that’s exactly what this series is for. I read everything and often the best posts come from reader questions!

And if you found this helpful, please share it. These are long posts because the law is complex and small posts don’t do it justice. But the more people understand how these cases actually work (not the Threads version, the legal version) the better the conversation gets.

Thanks for reading. More soon.

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This is Part Three in a series breaking down summary judgment in the Blake Lively v. Justin Baldoni case. Part one (the standard, is available here); Part two (the Judge, is available here).

Before we get into each of the legal claims, we need to understand the facts. Or, more accurately, the two competing “versions” (yes this is a Taylor Swift reference) of what happened during the making of It Ends With Us.

This is the kind of case where the facts don’t just matter for the legal analysis, they are the legal analysis. The same text message can be a smoking gun or an innocent explanation depending on whose story you believe.

So let’s walk through both versions. Then you can decide for yourself.

Quick disclosure: Everything in this post comes directly from the parties' own Memoranda of Law, Baldoni's motion for summary judgment and Lively's opposition. These are the facts each side selected and framed to support their argument. This is not the complete evidentiary record. You can read Baldoni’s statement of facts and Lively’s response here.

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The Setup: A Feminist Brand Meets an A-List Actress

Here’s what nobody disputes:

Justin Baldoni built a career around his “Man Enough” brand, a self-described “movement around healthy manhood”. In 2019, Wayfarer (Baldoni’s production company, financed by Paylocity founder Steve Sarowitz) acquired rights to It Ends With Us, Colleen Hoover’s novel about domestic violence and female empowerment. Hoover was reluctant to option it to a man, but agreed because she believed Baldoni “used his platform to empower women”.

When Blake Lively showed interest in late 2022, Wayfarer went into full-court press to secure her for the role of Lily Bloom. Producer Jamey Heath texted:

Lively met with Baldoni on December 14, 2022, a meeting Baldoni described as a “love fest.” She signed on. Filming was scheduled for May 2023.

And… that’s where the stories split.

Baldoni’s Version? The Power-Hungry Actress

According to Baldoni, this is a story about a powerful actress who weaponized false harassment allegations to hijack his film.

His narrative:

Blake Lively knew what she signed up for. The film was deliberately sexually charged. Lively reviewed notes from a Sony executive saying audiences expected something “grown up and sexy” with “real heat.” She herself rewrote scenes to increase “sexual tension,” including one where Baldoni’s character says “I want to fuck you”. She told her agent the film’s “sexiness” was “critical to its success”.

She wanted control from the start. Even before filming began, Lively:

• Had production relocated from Boston to New Jersey (near her home)

• Changed the filming schedule for her personal commitments

• Immediately assumed an active role in script development

• Used famous friends to pressure him (enlisted Taylor Swift to promote her scene rewrite, calling Baldoni “this doofus director” and “a clown”)

The “harassment” was trivial workplace interactions. Every incident Lively complains about was either:

• An innocent conversation she’s mischaracterizing (ie. the circumcision discussion: she raised the topic because she was pregnant and considering it for her son and Baldoni just shared his own parents’ decision)

• A practical concern (ie. he asked about her weight because he had chronic back problems and would need to lift her)

• Standard behavior for a film with sexual themes (ie. her own comments about wardrobe being “sexy”)

• Immediately resolved when raised. After the June 1, 2023 meeting where he apologized, Lively identified zero additional incidents

She manufactured a crisis to gain leverage. In November 2023 (five months after filming had stopped due to strikes) Lively’s lawyers sent a list of 17 “protections” she demanded before returning to set. Many of these “implicated conduct Lively herself had engaged in”, like improvised kissing or comments on personal appearance. The letter was manipulation, designed to give her power over him.

But he signed it anyway. Because he wanted to finish the film professionally. Phase 2 of filming (January-February 2024) proceeded without incident. Lively even told another cast member the set was “professional”.

Then she hijacked his film. He says that after filming wrapped:

• She told Sony she wouldn’t promote the film unless allowed to participate in the edit

• She recruited famous friends (the Damons, Ben Affleck, Taylor Swift) to pressure Sony, disparaging Baldoni as a chaotic clown

• She connived with Swift to use music rights as leverage

• She pushed Sony to use her cut even though Baldoni’s cut tested higher with audiences

• She tried to get a p.g.a. producers mark by claiming she’d “produced every moment of this film”

• She removed his “film by” credit from the final cut

She turned everyone against him. Lively and Ryan Reynolds:

• Unfollowed him on social media, encouraging press speculation about a “feud”

• Told Hollywood power players he belonged in “jail” and was a “thoroughbred predatory fraudster”

• Excluded him from all press events

• Told Sony she wouldn’t attend the premiere if he was there. He ultimately had to leave the red carpet before she arrived, wait in a basement, and watch the film in a separate theater

She started the PR war. By late July 2024, Baldoni faced “a new set of concerns relating to media coverage” following the premiere. The cast refused to be photographed with him. His own premiere had become humiliating.

He hired crisis management to defend himself. In late July, he retained TAG PR for defensive reputation management. His team agreed they “should not be doing anything proactive”. They distributed positive information about him and worked to minimize negative coverage, standard operating procedure for PR professionals.

The backlash against Lively was organic. She suffered negative publicity because of her own missteps:

• Cross-promoting a domestic violence film with her husband’s superhero movie and her own haircare line and alcoholic beverage products

• Old controversies resurfacing (ie. getting married on a former slave plantation, allegations of being difficult to work with, a 2016 interview where she mockingly called an interviewer pregnant)

Even Sony executives observed the negative publicity was “driven by Lively’s own ill-advised promotional strategies”. His PR team merely responded to media inquiries with truthful information.

Their bottom line?

Lively manufactured sexual harassment claims 18 months after they’d been resolved, coordinated with the New York Times on a hit piece, and filed this lawsuit to destroy his reputation because she couldn’t accept that the public saw through her facade.

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Lively’s Version: The Predatory Hypocrite

According to Lively, this is a story about a man who monetized a fake feminist brand while creating a hostile, sexualized workplace, then orchestrated a coordinated campaign to bury her before she could speak publicly.

Her narrative?

The feminist brand was a façade. Baldoni had publicly admitted to past sexual misconduct, but his behavior on set proved he hadn’t changed. Multiple women (Lively, Co-Stars Jenny Slate and Isabella Ferrer, Producer Alex Saks, Author Colleen Hoover) independently experienced or witnessed his inappropriate conduct.

He asked for her help. From the moment Lively signed on, Baldoni “aggressively leveraged” her fame and two decades of industry experience, “regularly soliciting her feedback” on virtually every aspect of pre-production: casting decisions, hiring choices, wardrobe and makeup, set design and decoration, and extensive script revisions. He gushed to her that she was a “genuine collaborator” and “a once in a lifetime talent” who made “everyone around” her and “everything” she touches “better.” He wanted her star power, her creative input, her industry connections. He needed her collaboration to make the film work.

He created a hostile work environment from day one. Starting with their first meeting and continuing throughout production:

December 14, 2022: During their first meeting, Baldoni volunteered that his penis was circumcised without Lively expressing any interest in the subject of his genitalia. (Baldoni claims she raised the topic, Lively says she did not.)

April 2023: In a car ride with her driver and assistant, Baldoni volunteered that “women had forced themselves on him” and he had “forced himself on women” even “when they said no or did not consent”. He warned the admission “stays in this car”. Her driver immediately told her not to be alone with Baldoni and advised that he wanted to run a background check on Baldoni.

April 24, 2023: Without her consent, Baldoni asked her personal trainer how much she would weigh in two weeks (the start of filming). He also introduced her to his personal health advisor who specialized in weight loss and was eager to recommend how she could “work on fat loss”.

Pre-filming: Baldoni added gratuitous sexual content to the script without her knowledge or consent, violating her contractual approval rights. When challenged, he volunteered intimate details about his own sex life (that he and his wife orgasm in tandem, and he sometimes brings her to orgasm through oral sex without climaxing himself) and asked if she and Reynolds climaxed at the same time during sex.

May 16, 2023 (Second day of filming): Jamey Heath (Wayfarer CEO and producer) arrived unannounced at Lively’s hair and makeup trailer while her team was removing body makeup. Her nude breasts were exposed. When her team screamed “whoa, whoa, whoa” and “no, no, no” and “don’t come in,” Heath entered anyway. He insisted the meeting happen then or not at all. Lively relented on condition he face the wall and “look away”. Mid-conversation, Lively alleges she looked up to find Heath staring straight at her breasts in the mirror. He apologized but defended himself by saying he liked to “make eye contact with people when I talk to them.”

All three women were in shock. Baker (Lively’s makeup artist) said Heath crossed a boundary she’d “never seen crossed on a film set”. Carroll (Lively’s hairstylist) was so disturbed she started locking the trailer door.

May 22, 2023: The Birth Scene didn’t call for nudity, but on the day of filming, Baldoni told Lively (a mother of four) it was “not normal” for women to stay in hospital gowns during delivery. Despite SAG guidelines requiring advance consent to nudity, Baldoni and Heath insisted during the shoot that Lively simulate full nudity. She felt forced to agree. The scene was filmed over several hours with a male actor positioned between her spread legs while she wore only a hospital gown covering her breasts and a small piece of fabric covering her genitalia. The intimacy coordinator wasn’t on set (though she later said she should have been). Wayfarer didn’t implement closed-set protocols. Lively felt humiliated.

May 23, 2023: A series of incidents:

• The day after filming the birthing scene, Heath approached Lively while she was eating and, without warning or obtaining her consent, started playing a video of a fully naked woman with her legs spread apart. Lively was confused and initially thought he was showing pornography. Heath explained it was a video of his wife giving birth. When Lively asked if he had his wife’s consent to share it, Heath replied “she isn’t weird about this stuff”.

• While Lively was wearing her own jacket over her own dress with a lower-cut neckline (to facilitate breastfeeding), the jacket popped open when she bent down. Baldoni gestured toward her breasts and said “I like your outfit” in an objectifying tone. Later that day, before filming a bar scene, he pressured her to remove her jacket, looked at her and said “pretty hot” in a tone that made her feel “on display”. When she said “that’s not what I’m going for,” Baldoni said “Sexy?”

• Baldoni asked Lively if she and her husband, Reynolds, climaxed at the same time during sex. Baldoni also discussed his past addiction to pornography, a topic that had no connection to the Film’s material, which Lively attempted to shut down by sharing that she had never seen it. Baldoni later humiliated Lively by sharing her private disclosure in front of cast and crew, saying: “Blake doesn’t know anything about [pornography]; she’s never seen it.”

Co-Star Jenny Slate intervened, telling Baldoni that “comments about actors’ bodies” are inappropriate. Video footage shows Baldoni rolling his eyes and sarcastically stating “Sorry. I missed the sexual harassment training” before walking away in a huff.

• During filming of the Dance Scene (which wasn’t written to include any intimacy), Baldoni spontaneously improvised physical contact: repeatedly leaning in toward Lively, attempting to kiss her, kissing her forehead, rubbing his face and mouth against her neck, putting his thumb to her mouth and flicking her lower lip. Behind-the-scenes footage captures Lively’s visible discomfort, leaning and pulling away from him, repeatedly suggesting their characters should just talk.

That evening, Lively texted her friend (Baldoni’s former podcast host) an “SOS” saying: “Whoa...It’s like HR nuts today. The both of them...I came home and cried...keep your hormones to yourselves...I don’t want your gaze or words or tongue or videos of your naked wife. Yeah. It’s shocking.”.

She reported inappropriate incidents repeatedly, and was dismissed each time.

May 26, 2023: Lively had a 45-minute call with a Sony executive, saying she felt “the set was untenable and unruly” with “no structure” and “no one in charge” and “the people who were in charge were misbehaving”. She asked if she could file a complaint with Sony’s HR. The Sony executive said only Wayfarer could address her concerns, then reported Lively’s complaints directly to Baldoni and Heath.

May 27, 2023: Jenny Slate reported her own concerns to her agent, saying “Justin and Jamey are truly unfit” and she felt “repulsed and deeply irritated, and I know Blake is experiencing that on a much more serious level”. Producer Alex Saks escalated these concerns directly to Baldoni and Heath.

Wayfarer refused to investigate. Heath decided “it would be better for all of this not to be on an official record” because they “didn’t want the behavior written down, documented anywhere, in the event that someone wanted to talk about it again in the future”. Baldoni thought it was “silly” to think Heath could be inappropriate. Sarowitz (Wayfarer’s financier) didn’t investigate either, instead suggesting “he should come to set and remind [Lively] whose money this is”.

Lively’s team says this was radically different from how Wayfarer handled a male-initiated complaint of age discrimination around this same time, which Heath promptly sent to HR for investigation.

June 1, 2023: In a production meeting, Lively expressed “real concerns” about the unprofessional behavior, saying it “has to stop”. Neither Baldoni nor Heath offered HR support or assured her the set would be safe going forward. Baldoni later testified he saw “no reason” to investigate the trailer intrusion. Neither he nor anyone at Wayfarer elevated the concerns to their HR department.

November 9, 2023: After five months away during the strikes, Lively was “dreading” returning to set. Through her attorneys, she sent a document with 17 protections she needed before returning, including that an intimacy coordinator be present, no spontaneous improvisation of intimacy, no comments about her body, no intrusion into her trailer while undressed, and an explicit anti-retaliation clause.

Baldoni’s immediate reaction? He sent the letter to his PR team, convened an emergency call, and texted a group chat titled “prayers and support”…

He dismissed it as “all manipulation” and accused Lively of using her allegations about how “unsafe I and the workplace were” as “an effort to gain power over [him] personally and the studio”.

Despite claiming it was manipulation and false, Baldoni and Heath didn’t initiate any investigation to clear their names. Instead, Wayfarer conceded that the 17 Protections were “not only reasonable but also essential for the benefit of all parties involved” and signed them into a contract.

January 4, 2024: At the required all-hands meeting, Lively read from a 30-point list on her phone detailing the behaviors she needed to stop, including discussions of personal sex experiences; times physical consent wasn’t given in sexual acts; improvising of kissing, and biting or sucking of lips.

The next day, Baldoni texted friends that Lively had shared all the ways he “made her feel unsafe”, used the words “creepy and abuse”, and said “this was the worst experience of her life”. He rejected that his conduct was inappropriate but conceded: “it’s hard to feel so much of what they believe about me is false because they are so convinced that it’s real”.

Phase 2 filming proceeded, but the retaliation was already being planned.

He feared exposure. Text messages show Baldoni felt Lively was holding a “nuclear bomb” because “she can leak that I’m a bad person or that she felt unsafe with me and ‘all the stuff’ she has on me”. It’s the “Taylor Swift playbook.”

The planning started months before the premiere:

May 17, 2024: Baldoni asked his PR team for a “real plan so I can feel at ease” if Lively blocked him on social media and fans went “digging”.

June 17, 2024: After a Book Bonanza event where Lively, Hoover, and cast appeared without him, Baldoni asked his publicist to recommend lawyers. One recommended Bryan Freedman, describing him as “a killer” who “would bury Blake”. The same day, Wayfarer began assembling a “timeline doc” of each “alleged incident” to “tell the story chronologically”

July 24, 2024: Abel planned to “go through point by point and draft context surrounding each situation” and “flag what we are missing that would be helpful to arm us in the case we need to refute any of the claims”. Heath was “compiling info on the various incidents which will be helpful to ensure we are in the know on everything, we will need potential witnesses, locations/context, people who could be in our corner to speak on background to refute any claims.”.

July 25, 2024: Baldoni, Heath, and Wayfarer had an introductory call with TAG PR (a Crisis PR company founded by Melissa Nathan). According to notes taken during the call, Wayfarer confirmed many of the on-set incidents had occurred. They discussed going on the offense: there were “enough friendly reporters and people who would create a story that we wanted to create.”. They discussed narratives to cultivate: that Lively “took the movie over,” committed “extortion,” “weaponized feminism”.

After the call, Wayfarer engaged TAG.

July 31, 2024: Abel texted about seeding the “weaponized feminism” narrative with a writer at People, Fox News, In Touch, and US Weekly, explaining the writer “is fully briefed of the situation and is armed and ready to take this story of Blake weaponizing feminism to any of her outlets the minute we give her the green light”.

August 2, 2024: TAG sent a “Scenario Planning” document laying out scenarios “we should be prepared for, should BL and her team make her grievances public”. It recommended they “get ahead of this narrative” with messaging including:

• “When BL wasn’t able to get her way on set or behind the scenes, she involved her husband to create an imbalance of power”

• “BL’s less than favorable reputation in the industry spans decades and has been reported”

• “TAG team can explore planting stories about the weaponization of feminism and how people in BL’s circle like Taylor Swift, have been accused of utilizing these tactics to ‘bully’ into getting what they want”

Baldoni found it insufficiently aggressive. Abel conveyed that Baldoni “wants to feel like” Lively “can be buried”.

Nathan responded:

“When we send over documents we can’t send over the work we will or could do because that could get us in a lot of trouble. We can’t write we will destroy her...Imagine if a document saying all the things that he wants ends up in the wrong hands. You know we can bury anyone. But I can’t write that to him.“

Nathan and Abel planned to discuss a “more aggressive way to get ahead of this” in a subsequent call with Baldoni.

August 3, 2024: Wayfarer formally engaged TAG. Nathan immediately contacted a Daily Mail editor to make sure she was “ready when we are.” Baldoni’s agent reported that Baldoni’s “crisis team was ready for a war” and had “all kinds of garbage on” Lively

The campaign launched with the premiere.

August 5, 2024: Nathan provided quotes for digital services that would be “most importantly untraceable,” including “full reddit, full social account take downs,” “engage with audiences the right way, start threads of theories,” and “creation of social fan engagement to go back and forth with any negative accounts, helping change narrative.”

The same day, during the press junket, Baldoni departed from Sony’s approved marketing strategy. Abel reported that he “said exactly like what we discussed about navigating complex character and as a director managing personalities and the natural friction on set.” The PR team texted “PERFECT” and “love” the word “friction”.

Sony immediately told them to stop using “friction”—they feared it would be “clickbait.” Abel texted Baldoni:

“Sony is having a hard time with the word ‘friction.’ They think it will be taken out as clickbait. They obviously don’t know about our strategy but let’s stick to the words of ‘challenge.’”

Within a week, dozens of articles used “friction” to speculate about on-set tensions.

August 6-9, 2024: The film premiered August 6 and was released August 9. It was a massive commercial success, wildly exceeding expectations. There was consensus that Lively was largely responsible for the film’s success.

But behind the scenes, TAG, Abel, and Street Relations went into “full throttle mode”:

• They confirmed the “digital team is amplifying” negative TikTok videos Baldoni sent them

• They drafted talking points for a Daily Mail reporter questioning why Blake promoted a domestic violence film with flowers and her own products

• They praised online comments echoing their scenario planning themes: “Thank the lord for Jed [Wallace]” and “Thank the lord for social and digital mitigation lol”

• They celebrated that they’d “confused people” with “so much mixed messaging”

• They reported seeing “a shift on social, due largely to Jed and his team’s efforts to shift the narrative towards shining a spotlight on Blake and Ryan”

August 18, 2024: Baldoni asked whether the digital team was using “bots”. Nathan responded that bots “look fake to anyone” but confirmed the “other team is doing something very specific in terms of what they do.” Baldoni responded “Ok thank you” with prayer hands and heart emojis.

The result?

Within weeks, public sentiment “swung very negative” against Lively. There was a “tidal wave of online hatred.” Sony reported that 89% of online response was pro-Justin, only 4% pro-Lively.

Two of Lively’s experts who analyzed the online activity found evidence of manipulation. The patterns showed a “complete absence of conversations echoing the manipulated Lively narratives” before August 2024, then a “sharp increase after August 2024” in both conversations endorsing those narratives and overall negative volume.

But they didn’t stop after the film’s success.

August 29, 2024: Sarowitz, told a director from another project (Claire Ayoub) on a call that he would protect Wayfarer “like Israel protected itself from Hamas. There were 39,000 dead bodies. There will be two dead bodies when I’m done.”

December 21, 2024: After Lively filed her complaint and the New York Times published its article, Freedman issued a statement falsely claiming Wayfarer “did nothing proactive nor retaliated.”

The campaign continued even after she sued:

• January 3, 2025: They coordinated with Sage Steele (an online creator and Freedman’s former client) to create a video that would look “organic”

• January 7, 2025: Freedman went on Megyn Kelly’s show to falsely accuse Lively of “making threats” and using harassment allegations “to leverage her position”

• January 16, 2025: They filed a $400 million lawsuit against Lively and Reynolds

• January 21, 2025: They released raw footage of the Dance Scene to friendly media outlets, resulting in headlines claiming the video “proved” Lively lied

Lively’s bottom line?

Baldoni created a hostile work environment, was repeatedly warned by multiple women, refused to investigate, then orchestrated a sophisticated campaign to destroy Lively’s reputation before she could speak publicly, and continued retaliating even after she sued.

Where They Actually Agree

Let’s pause and identify what’s NOT disputed:

The incidents:

• The circumcision discussion happened (they dispute who raised the topic)

• Baldoni asked about Lively’s weight (they dispute the motive)

• Baldoni added sexual content to the script (they dispute whether it was appropriate)

• Baldoni talked about porn

• Heath entered Lively’s trailer while she was topless (they dispute whether she “permitted” it, where he looked, and what his intent was)

• Heath showed her a video involving his nude wife (they dispute the context)

• Baldoni improvised physical intimacy during the Dance Scene (they dispute whether it was collaborative)

• Baldoni used the word “sexy” about clothing (they dispute appropriateness in context)

The timeline:

• June 1, 2023: Meeting where Baldoni apologized

• November 9, 2023: Lively sent the 17 Protections

• Wayfarer signed them, calling them “not only reasonable but also essential”

• January 4, 2024: All-hands meeting where Lively again raised concerns

• May-July 2024: Baldoni’s team began planning for potential PR crisis

• July 25, 2024: Wayfarer hired TAG

• August 2, 2024: “We can bury anyone” exchange

• August 5-9, 2024: Coordinated PR activities during premiere and release

• Film was massive commercial success

• Public sentiment turned sharply negative against Lively

The cast:

• Multiple cast and crew members (Co-Star Jenny Slate, Screenwriter Christy Hall, Author Colleen Hoover, others) independently refused to be photographed with Baldoni

• Producer Alex Saks didn’t want to be pictured with him either

• Rather than investigate why, Baldoni’s team brainstormed cover stories to explain (ie. family trip, hospitalization, neurodivergence)

The evidence:

• Baldoni texted about feeling Lively held a “nuclear bomb” that could expose him

• Abel (Baldoni’s own publicist) described the Dance Scene as “so gross” and “cringy”

• The “we can bury anyone” exchange happened

• The Scenario Planning document exists with those specific narratives

• It seems like they did “boost” negative content about Lively in August 2024

• Baldoni used the word “friction” during press despite Sony telling him not to, with his publicist explicitly referencing “our strategy”

The Main Questions

Everything comes down to these disputes:

1. Was the on-set behavior harassment or innocent workplace interactions?

Lively says it was harassment. Pattern of sexualization and boundary violations that made multiple women uncomfortable

Baldoni says it was innocent. Trivial incidents, appropriate for a sexually-charged film, mischaracterized in hindsight

The evidence? Contemporary texts show Lively saying she cried after a day on set due to Heath and Baldoni’s behavior. Slate contemporaneously complained about similar behavior. Multiple women independently concluded Baldoni was inappropriate.

2. Why was TAG hired?

Lively says as preemptive retaliation. Planning started in May 2024 (months before premiere, before she spoke publicly) because Baldoni feared she’d expose him

Baldoni says as defensive crisis management in late July 2024 in response to Lively’s campaign to exclude and disparage him

The evidence?

The TAG PR planning document is hard to argue as purely defensive. The “we can bury anyone” and “our strategy” texts suggest offense, not defense. But Lively and Reynolds did send messages about Baldoni to Hollywood power players.

3. Was the backlash organic or manufactured?

Lively says Defendants orchestrated a sophisticated campaign with “untraceable” digital services to manipulate online discourse

Baldoni says the backlash was an organic response to Lively’s tone-deaf marketing mistakes

The evidence?

Both are likely partially true. Lively did make marketing missteps that provided material, though it appears as if she was following Wayfarer/Sony marketing guidance. But there’s documentation of TAG actively boosting negative content, seeding narratives with reporters, and celebrating their “social and digital mitigation” efforts. Experts found manipulation patterns. The question is causation, did TAG create the backlash, or amplify an organic one?

Why This Matters for Summary Judgment

Judge Liman will be looking at whether there are genuine disputes of material fact that require a jury.

On the harassment claims?

These are classic credibility battles. Lively has contemporary documentation (her texts, Slate’s complaints, others’ corroboration), but Baldoni has context arguments (sexually charged film, her own sexual content contributions). This likely survives summary judgment.

On the retaliation claims?

Lively has very strong documentary evidence. The May 2024 planning timeline, the “we can bury anyone” exchange, the “our strategy” text, the documented boosting activities, these create genuine disputes about intent that a jury should resolve.

On causation/damages?

The backlash clearly happened. The question is how much Defendants caused vs. amplified. That’s a jury question.

The wild card?

Multiple cast members independently refusing to appear with Baldoni. That’s powerful corroboration that’s very hard to dismiss as Lively “poisoning the well”.

What to Watch For

As this case moves forward, pay attention to:

1. The credibility indicators

• Contemporary documentation vs. post-litigation explanations

• Consistency of accounts over time

• Independent corroboration

• Parties’ own words used against them

2. The “consciousness of guilt” evidence

• Baldoni’s “nuclear bomb” texts showing fear of exposure

• Refusing to investigate despite calling allegations “manipulation”

• “We can bury anyone”: what you say when you’re planning offense, not defense

• The timeline is arguably preemptive, not reactive

3. The pattern vs. isolated incident framing

• Lively frames as pattern of sexualization affecting multiple women

• Baldoni treats each incident as isolated and innocuous

• The truth probably lies in how many incidents you believe happened as Lively describes

4. The causation battle

• Did Baldoni’s team manufacture the backlash or amplify organic backlash?

• Expert testimony will be critical

• Note: “Amplification” can (likely) still be actionable

The Bottom Line

The central disputes (did harassment occur, what was Baldoni’s intent in hiring TAG, did the PR campaign cause Lively’s damages) likely turn on credibility determinations that only a jury can make. Meaning they may survive summary judgment.

The documentary evidence is extensive. The contemporary reactions are powerful. The “we can bury anyone” text is terrible. But Baldoni has context defenses and evidence of Lively’s own missteps.

A jury will need to decide who’s telling the truth.

And that’s exactly what summary judgment is designed to preserve: the right to have your story heard when reasonable minds could disagree.

Next up: We’ll break down each legal claim and what Judge Liman will be looking for when he decides what survives Baldoni’s motion summary judgment.

Questions? Thoughts on whose version you find more credible? Drop them in the comments.

This is Part Two in a series breaking down summary judgment in the Blake Lively v. Justin Baldoni case. This week, we’ll move past the noise and get into the actual claims.

If you’ve followed the Blake Lively vs. Justin Baldoni case for more than twelve minutes, you’ve seen it…

“Judge Liman is biased.”
“He’s protecting Lively”
“He hates ___.”
“He’s a Hollywood judge protecting his brother.”

No. Stop.

When people tell you a federal judge is biased because he ruled against their favorite narrative or their favorite celebrity, that is fan fiction.

The truth is less dramatic and way more boring (which is exactly why the internet struggles with it):

Judge Liman rules like a federal judge.

He applies the standard in front of him.
He writes thoroughly.
He cares about procedure.
And he’s not there to validate anyone’s feelings about Blake Lively or Justin Baldoni.

First: what “bias” would even mean here?

If you’re going to accuse a sitting Article III judge of bias, you should at least know what you’re alleging.

“Bias” doesn’t mean:

• “He didn’t rule the way I wanted.”

• “He used a tone I didn’t like.”

• “He did not address an argument I personally found persuasive on TikTok.”

Bias means improper partiality, and federal courts have actual standards for that.

THE LEGAL STANDARD FOR JUDICIAL BIAS

If anyone involved genuinely believe a judge is biased, there’s a legal mechanism for that: a motion for recusal under 28 U.S.C. § 455.

When a Judge MUST Recuse:

The statute requires recusal when:

1. The judge has a personal bias or prejudice concerning a party, OR

2. The judge has personal knowledge of disputed evidentiary facts, OR

3. The judge has a financial interest in the outcome, OR

4. The judge’s impartiality might reasonably be questioned by an objective observer

A judge making rulings you don’t like, even harsh ones, is not bias. That’s being a Judge.

What WOULD require recusal:

• Financial interest in the outcome

• Personal relationship with a party or attorney

• Prior involvement as counsel in the matter

• Extrajudicial source of bias (something outside the courtroom proceedings)

In this case:

• Neither Blake Lively nor Justin Baldoni has filed a motion for recusal

• Neither side has alleged grounds under § 455

• Both sides have sophisticated, experienced litigation counsel

• Both sets of lawyers continue litigating before Judge Liman

If Judge Liman were actually biased in a legally meaningful way, these experienced litigators would file a recusal motion. They haven’t.

That should tell you something.

So why do people claim Judge Liman is biased?

Because the case is emotionally charged and the internet is allergic to complexity.

This case has:

• celebrities

• PR

• alleged retaliation / smear campaigns

• discovery fights

• spoliation allegations

• and a fandom ecosystem that treats court filings like sports highlights (why else would you be reading this?)

And in this ecosystem, Judge Liman is either a hero or a villain. There is no middle.

But the judge is not part of the storyline.

He’s doing what judges do: managing a case, resolving disputes, applying standards, and writing orders that withstand review.

“But he ruled against my side!”

Yes. Judges do that.

Also: it’s worth noticing which kinds of arguments tend to get people mad at him. It’s usually the ones that rely on:

• assumptions not supported by the record,

• dramatic character attacks,

• or “this must be true because it feels true.”

Judge Liman does not reward that.

And when he says so plainly, people label it “bias” instead of “the law.”

THE REALITY OF ARTICLE III JUDGES

Judge Liman is a federal judge appointed under Article III of the Constitution. If you want to understand why claims of bias don’t make sense, you need to understand how federal judges actually work.

He’s Appointed for Life

Federal judges serve lifetime appointments. Judge Liman cannot be fired. He cannot be voted out. He cannot be removed unless Congress impeaches him (which has happened to only 15 federal judges in U.S. history).

The founders designed it this way so judges could make unpopular decisions without fear of retaliation. The whole point of lifetime tenure is to insulate judges from public pressure, including pressure from angry people on the internet.

Judge Liman doesn’t need Blake Lively to like him. He doesn’t need Justin Baldoni to like him. He doesn’t need you or me to like him.

He doesn’t face reelection. He doesn’t answer to celebrity publicists. He doesn’t care about Threads discourse, TikTok videos, or Reddit posts.

He answers to the law. That’s it.

He Has No Financial Incentive to Favor Anyone

Federal judges receive a salary set by Congress ($249,900 as of 2026). That salary cannot be reduced while they’re in office, and it doesn’t change based on who wins cases in their courtroom.

Judge Liman makes the same salary whether he rules for Lively or Baldoni. He doesn’t benefit financially from either outcome.

What he does care about?

His professional reputation. His decisions are reviewed by appellate courts and read by other judges, lawyers, and legal scholars. The quality of his legal reasoning matters to his standing in the legal community.

Getting reversed by the Second Circuit? That matters.

Random people on the internet mad at him? That doesn’t.

The entire structure of Article III judgeships is designed to make judges independent and immune to exactly the kind of pressure people are trying to apply here.

THE APPELLATE REALITY CHECK

Here’s the simplest proof that Judge Liman isn’t biased: his decisions get reviewed by judges who have no reason to protect him.

How Appeals Work

When Judge Liman issues a ruling, the losing party can appeal to the Second Circuit Court of Appeals. Three appellate judges review his legal reasoning. If he got the law wrong, they reverse him. If he applied the law correctly, they affirm him.

Appellate judges don’t care about the drama in the underlying case. They care about whether the district judge applied the correct legal standards.

Judge Liman’s Track Record

What This Tells Us

When three federal appellate judges with no personal investment in the underlying cases review Judge Liman’s work, they consistently find that his legal reasoning is sound. CONSISTENTLY.

If Judge Liman were actually biased:

• His decisions would be based on who he wants to win, not what the law requires

• His legal reasoning would be results-oriented and sloppy

• The Second Circuit would catch it and reverse him

You Can’t Have It Both Ways

Either:

• Judge Liman applies the law correctly (which is why appellate courts affirm him), OR

• Judge Liman is biased and makes legally unsupportable rulings (which appellate courts would reverse)

His track record proves it’s the former.

That’s how the system works. That’s why the appellate record matters.

Judge Liman writes his orders knowing that three appellate judges will scrutinize every legal conclusion. That’s his real audience. Not the internet.

And when they review his work, they affirm it. Because it’s grounded in law, not favoritism.

A quick tour of Liman’s previous summary judgment decisions, for the people who think he’s secretly on someone’s payroll

If you want to understand Judge Liman at summary judgment, here’s the cheat code:

He is not “pro-plaintiff” or “pro-defendant.”

He is pro-standard.

What that looks like in real life?

• When a party can’t support or dispute a key element with admissible evidence, he grants SJ.

• When there’s a real factual dispute, or credibility is central, he denies SJ.

• When claims are overreached, he trims them, often without killing the entire case, just narrowing it to what is actually triable.

He Takes Evidence Seriously

In Brockington v. Dollar General Corp. Judge Liman granted summary judgment to the defendant in a consumer fraud class action.

In the above case, Judge Liman granted summary judgment to the defendant in a consumer fraud class action alleging deceptive labeling of “Honey Graham Crackers.”

There, the plaintiff argued he paid a premium for crackers labeled as containing honey, or alternatively that he relied on the labeling to his detriment.

At his deposition, the plaintiff testified that:

• He purchased the product because Dollar General’s products are cheaper than competitors’

• He didn’t know of any graham crackers with a lower price

• He didn’t believe the product was worth less than what he paid, even knowing what he now knew about the ingredients

The plaintiff’s damages expert, submitted a declaration describing methodologies he could use to calculate a price premium, but admitted he hadn’t actually performed the analysis, hadn’t acquired the necessary data, and hadn’t finalized his methodology.

Judge Liman granted summary judgment for Dollar General, holding that the plaintiff failed to provide admissible evidence of injury. The opinion emphasized that “a proposal to identify evidence at some yet-to-be-determined date is not sufficient to survive summary judgment when Plaintiff is required to come forward with admissible evidence to raise a genuine issue of fact for trial.”

Allegations aren’t enough at summary judgment. You need actual, admissible evidence of each element of your claim. When a party can’t meet the evidentiary threshold, Judge Liman will grant summary judgment.

Promises to develop evidence later don’t create a genuine issue of material fact.

But He Protects Jury Issues on Credibility and Intent

In Hoxhaj v. Michael Cetta, Inc. (May 2023), No. 21-cv-6486 (S.D.N.Y. May 15, 2023), three Muslim plaintiffs who worked as front-of-house managers at Sparks Steakhouse alleged religious discrimination and hostile work environment under the New York City Human Rights Law (I note that this is not the same law that will be applied to Blake Lively’s employment claims).

Plaintiffs alleged that one of the restaurant owners, made repeated derogatory comments about Islam and Muslim people, including:

• Calling Islam “bad” and saying he “hates Islam”

• Stating that Muslim people are “crazy” because they don’t drink alcohol

• Asking “how long this F Ramadan going to last?”

• Saying there is “trouble” anywhere Muslims live

• Making a “joke” that the capital of Pakistan is “Islam is bad”

When one plaintiff complained to the other owner, Michael Cetta, he allegedly responded that “Steve is right about these Islam things” and that “Islams are crazy but the Muslims are okay.”

The restaurant moved for summary judgment, arguing that:

• These were “stray remarks” that didn’t change the terms and conditions of employment

• The comments were merely “petty slights or trivial inconveniences” under NYCHRL

• The plaintiffs worked there for decades without being fired, which showed no discriminatory animus

• There was no connection between the comments and any adverse employment action

Judge Liman denied summary judgment on the religious discrimination claims.

His reasoning?

• Under NYCHRL, plaintiffs only need to show they were treated “less well” because of their religion, not that they suffered an adverse employment action

• The defendant bears the burden of proving the conduct was merely “petty slights or trivial inconveniences”

• A reasonable jury could find that repeatedly telling an employee that his religion “is bad,” that practitioners are “crazy,” and that the employer “hates” the employee’s faith rises above trivial conduct

• These weren’t isolated comments, they were frequent and ongoing

• The fact that plaintiffs worked there for decades doesn’t give the employer the right to continue making discriminatory comments

Judge Liman wrote that the remark that Muslim people are “crazy” for not drinking could be viewed by a reasonable juror as reflecting a discriminatory animus.

He emphasized that questions of intent, motive, and the employer’s state of mind are classic jury issues that cannot be resolved at summary judgment when there’s conflicting evidence.

When evidence involves questions of intent, motive, or credibility (especially in discrimination and retaliation cases) Judge Liman preserves those issues for trial.

He won’t weigh evidence or judge credibility at summary judgment. That’s the jury’s job.

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Shifting Explanations Create Jury Issues

In Luo v. AIK Renovation Inc., a discrimination case, Judge Liman denied summary judgment because the employer gave conflicting explanations for firing the plaintiff at different times.

These inconsistent reasons raised a genuine issue about the employer’s true motive. Judge Liman found the discrepancies “nudge the case over the line” into triable territory.

When a party’s story changes, or when evidence creates doubt about their true motives, Judge Liman sees that as a credibility issue for the jury.

What This Means for Lively v. Baldoni

Looking at Judge Liman’s track record, here’s what we can expect at summary judgment:

He’ll scrutinize the evidence very carefully. If either side claims facts are “undisputed” but they’re not properly supported by admissible evidence, Judge Liman will clock it.

He’ll protect genuine jury questions. Issues involving intent, motive, and credibility are classic jury questions. Whether that involves Baldoni’s reasons for hiring crisis PR, Lively’s motivations in filing complaints, or any other subjective state of mind issue, if there’s conflicting evidence, those questions likely survive summary judgment.

He’ll look for shifting explanations. If either party has given inconsistent explanations for their actions at different times, Judge Liman will treat that as a credibility issue. Inconsistent stories create disputes of fact that juries should resolve.

Partial summary judgment is likely. Based on his pattern, some claims will likely be dismissed while others proceed (this series will go into each claim).

Spoliation affects the evidentiary record. The use of auto-deletion features in Signal affects what evidence exists in the record. Judge Liman will have to determine what inferences, if any, can be drawn under Second Circuit spoliation standards.

Evidence quality matters more than evidence quantity. Judge Liman’s pattern shows he won’t be swayed by volume. One well-supported fact matters more than ten conclusory allegations. Both sides will need to back up their claims with admissible evidence, not just assertions.

Your takeaway?

If someone is selling you “Judge Liman is biased,” ask them to explain the standards applied in his previous decisions and identify the law or facts they think he ignored.

Spoiler: they usually can’t.

When you actually review the docket, there’s no pattern of favoring one party.

Judge Liman rules based on which side has the better legal argument on each specific issue.

Some motions Lively wins. Some motions Baldoni wins. Some are split.

That’s what happens when a judge applies legal standards neutrally rather than picking sides.

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Bottom line

People can disagree with Judge Liman’s rulings. That’s normal. That’s litigation.

But calling him biased because he refuses to do what the internet wants is not analysis.

If you want to critique a judge, critique the reasoning. Show me the standard. Show me the record. Show me the misapplication.

Questions? Drop them in the comments. If you have specific rulings you think demonstrate bias, cite the docket number and explain what legal standard you think was misapplied. Let’s discuss!

More to come this week. A claim-by-claim breakdown of the arguments, the facts, the governing standards, and how summary judgment is likely to narrow this case.

If you’ve been following the Blake Lively v. Justin Baldoni case, you know it’s been a procedural rollercoaster, sanctions motions, spoliation arguments, discovery fights, and now we’ve hit a major case milestone: summary judgment.

Summary judgment in this case is complicated. There are multiple claims, extensive factual disputes, and thousands of pages of evidence. Trying to cover it all in one post would be overwhelming (and honestly, unreadable).

So I’m breaking this down into a series:

ABOUT THIS SERIES

Part 1 (this post): Understanding the legal standard. What summary judgment is, how it works, and what Judge Liman will be looking at.

Part 2: What Judge Liman’s typical summary judgment decisions look like (and how long they typically take).

Part 3: The facts. What happened, what’s disputed, and what both sides agree on.

Part 4 and beyond: Claim-by-claim analysis, looking at each specific legal claim (sexual harassment, retaliation, defamation, etc.) and what both side are arguing.

By the end of this series, hopefully you’ll understand not just what Judge Liman (might) decide, but why, and you’ll be able to follow along with the legal reasoning.

For now, let’s start with the basics.

WHAT IS SUMMARY JUDGMENT?

Summary judgment is when one party asks the court to decide the case (or parts of it) before it goes to a jury trial.

The basic argument?

“Your Honor, there’s no genuine factual dispute here. If you apply the law to the undisputed facts, we win. No trial needed.”

Under Federal Rule of Civil Procedure 56, either party can file a motion for summary judgment arguing that the facts aren’t really in dispute, and when you apply the law to those facts, they should win as a matter of law.

Think of it as the “prove it or get it out of here” stage of litigation.

If the judge agrees there’s no genuine dispute of material fact, the case (or certain claims) ends right there. No witnesses. No jury. No dramatic courtroom scene. Just a legal ruling based on the record.

THE LEGAL STANDARD: WHAT DOES “NO GENUINE DISPUTE” MEAN?

This is the key question: Is there a genuine dispute of material fact?

Let’s break that down:

“Genuine dispute” = Could reasonable people look at the evidence and disagree about what actually happened?

If yes → genuine dispute → case goes to trial
If no → no genuine dispute → judge can decide it now

“Material fact” = Does this dispute actually matter to who wins under the law?

Some facts are disputed but don’t matter legally. Those don’t save you from summary judgment.

Example:

• “Did Baldoni hire crisis PR in May or June?” = Might be disputed, but probably not material

• “Did Baldoni hire crisis PR to retaliate against Blake for reporting harassment?” = Definitely material

THE BIG RULE: VIEW EVIDENCE IN THE LIGHT MOST FAVORABLE TO THE NON-MOVING PARTY

This is huge.

When deciding summary judgment, the judge has to view all the evidence, and all reasonable inferences from that evidence, in the light most favorable to the party opposing the motion.

What this means in practice?

If Lively moves for summary judgment, Judge Liman has to view the evidence in the light most favorable to Baldoni.

If Baldoni moves for summary judgment, Judge Liman has to view the evidence in the light most favorable to Lively.

That’s why summary judgment is less about drama and more about detail. You need the evidence to be so clear that no reasonable jury could rule against you.

WHAT DOES A SUMMARY JUDGMENT MOTION ACTUALLY LOOK LIKE?

It’s not one quick filing. It’s a massive coordinated package of documents. Here’s what gets filed:

1. The Notice of Motion

A formal request asking the court to grant summary judgment on specific claims. That is the image at the top of this post.

2. Memorandum of Law

This is the legal argument. It lays out:

• Table of Authorities (the law you are citing through the motion)

• Introduction

• Statement of Facts

• Argument that lays out:

  • What the legal standard is

  • What elements each claim requires

  • Why the evidence (or lack thereof) means the moving party should win

  • Why there’s no genuine dispute of material fact

• Conclusion

This is typically 25+ pages of dense legal argument with extensive citations to case law.

3. Rule 56.1 Statement of Undisputed Material Facts

This is the heart of the motion.

It’s a numbered list of every fact the moving party claims is undisputed. Each fact must be tied to specific admissible evidence.

Example from Balondi’s Rule 56.1 Statement:

Every. Single. Fact. Must be supported by citation to the record.

If you claim something is undisputed but don’t cite evidence, it doesn’t count.

4. Supporting Declarations and Exhibits

All the actual proof:

• Deposition transcripts

• Emails

• Text messages

• Contracts

• Expert reports

• Documents produced in discovery

Everything cited in the 56.1 Statement has to be attached as an exhibit. There are 100s of exhibits here.

JUDGE LIMAN’S SPECIFIC REQUIREMENTS

As shown in the above image, Judge Liman has Individual Practices that parties must follow. For summary judgment, he requires:

1. Word Version of 56.1 Statement

The moving party must provide the opposing party with a Word document version of their Rule 56.1 Statement (every numbered “undisputed” fact).

2. Line-by-Line Response

The opposing party then copies each numbered paragraph and responds directly underneath it.

Example from Blake Lively’s Rule 56.1 Response:

3. Every Response Must Be Tied to Admissible Evidence

You can’t just say “disputed.” You have to cite to specific evidence in the record that creates a genuine dispute.

HOW THE BURDEN OF PROOF WORKS

Step 1: Moving Party’s Burden

The party filing for summary judgment has to show one of two things:

Option A: Present evidence that disproves a key element of the other side’s claim

Example: “Blake claims retaliation, but here’s proof Baldoni hired crisis PR before she ever complained about workplace issues, so it couldn’t have been retaliatory.”

Option B: Argue that the other side has no admissible evidence to support an essential element.

Example from the 56.1 Statements:

Step 2: Non-Moving Party’s Burden

Once the moving party makes their showing, the burden shifts.

The opposing party must show the record does contain real, admissible evidence that creates a factual dispute.

You can’t just say “that’s wrong.”

You have to point to specific evidence (depositions, documents, expert reports) that shows reasonable people could disagree.”

THE TWO KEY QUESTIONS JUDGE LIMAN WILL ASK

Question 1: Is there a “genuine dispute”?

Could a reasonable jury look at this evidence and see it differently?

• If conflicting testimony exists → genuine dispute → survives

• If credibility is at issue → genuine dispute → survives

• If evidence could support multiple interpretations → genuine dispute → survives

Question 2: Is the dispute about a “material” fact?

Does this disagreement actually matter to who wins under the law?

• If it goes to an essential element of a claim → material → survives

• If it’s a side issue that doesn’t affect the legal outcome → not material → doesn’t save you

Both questions must be “no” for summary judgment to be granted.

If there’s a real factual fight, conflicting testimony, credibility issues, multiple interpretations, the claim survives and goes to trial.

The judge is NOT the jury at summary judgment.

The judge doesn’t decide who’s telling the truth. That’s the jury’s job.

The judge only decides: “Is there a factual dispute here that a jury needs to resolve?”

ORAL ARGUMENT: WHAT TO EXPECT

Unlike many summary judgment motions that are decided “on the papers” (just based on the written submissions), Judge Liman held oral argument on January 22, 2026 on the summary-judgment motions (and related spoliation issues). The hearing ran about three hours.

What is oral argument?

It’s when the lawyers for both sides appear before the judge to answer questions and argue their positions in person.

What happens at oral argument:

Before the hearing:

• Judge Liman will have read all the briefs, the Rule 56.1 Statements, and reviewed the key evidence

• He’ll have identified the issues he wants to hear more about

• He may have tentative views on certain points

During the hearing:

• Each side gets a set amount of time to present their arguments (here one hour)

• The judge will interrupt with questions (a lot of questions)

• This isn’t a speech, it’s more a conversation where the judge tests the strength of your arguments and asks about specific things

• Lawyers have to be ready to pivot based on what the judge is focused on

Given the complexity of the claims, the volume of evidence, and the contentious nature of the litigation, Judge Liman had a lot of questions.

WHAT HAPPENS AFTER SUMMARY JUDGMENT?

If Judge Liman DENIES summary judgment:

The case (or the surviving claims) goes/go to trial. A jury will decide the disputed facts.

If Judge Liman GRANTS summary judgment:

Those issues are decided right there. No jury needed. The case (or those claims) is over.

Partial summary judgment is common:

The judge might grant summary judgment on some claims but deny it on others.

Even if summary judgment is granted, it can be appealed. But that’s for later.

WHY THIS IS A BIG DEAL

Summary judgment is one of the most defining moments in any case.

It’s the point where you stop arguing what happened and start arguing what it means under the law.

It’s not just another filing. It’s an all-hands-on-deck, months-of-evidence, late-nights-and-Red-Bull kind of moment.

For the moving party: This is your chance to end the case (or parts of it) without the risk of a jury trial.

For the opposing party: This is your chance to show the evidence is strong enough that a jury needs to hear it.

For both sides: It’s a forced reckoning with your evidence.

WHAT THIS MEANS FOR LIVELY V. BALDONI

This case is... complicated.

We’re talking about:

• Multiple claims (retaliation, workplace harassment, defamation)

• Extensive discovery disputes

• Pending spoliation motions

• Sanctions motions

• Repeated discovery violations

• A docket that looks like a procedural war zone

Given all that, claiming “no genuine dispute exists” is... bold.

When your discovery record looks like a minefield, Rule 56 isn’t exactly easy.

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WHAT’S NEXT

In the next parts of this series, we’ll start to get into:

• Judge Liman’s style/timing/and what his Summary Judgment decisions have looked like in the past

• The specific claims Baldoni and Co. moved for summary judgment on

• What their key arguments are

• What evidence they’re citing

• What we can expect Judge Liman to focus on

For now, just remember…

Summary judgment is when the court decides: “Is there enough here for a jury to decide, or can I decide it now based on the law?”

It’s evidence-intensive, procedure-heavy, and absolutely critical.

And in a case like this one, with this much bad blood, this many discovery fights, and this much at stake, it’s going to be fascinating to see how Judge Liman navigates it.

Stay tuned for Part 2, where we’ll get into the actual claims and arguments.

If you have questions about summary judgment procedure, drop them in the comments.

P.S. for my favorite fans, yes I got an A+ in Federal Civil Procedure too.

© More with MJ 2025. All rights reserved.

The views expressed in this post are my own opinions based on publicly available court filings and documents as of January 2026. I am not involved in this case and have no access to non-public information, sealed filings, or privileged communications. This analysis could change as new documents are released or additional information becomes public.

A NOTE ON APPROACH

If you’ve followed this case, you’ve seen the Vanzan lawsuit characterized as everything from “criminal conspiracy” to “proof Blake Lively should be disbarred” (she’s not a lawyer, that does not make sense) to “this is why she’s going to jail” (she’s not).

The discourse has been so hyperbolic and one-sided that it’s become nearly impossible to have a reasonable conversation about what actually happened.

There are countless threads, videos, and posts analyzing every aspect of this lawsuit in the light LEAST favorable to Blake, assuming bad faith, malicious intent, and unethical behavior at every turn.

This post is the counterweight to that.

I’ll walk through what happened, explain why each step was legally proper, and show why the “she did something illegal” narrative doesn’t hold up.

If you’re looking for “Blake Lively is a criminal mastermind who broke the law,” this isn’t that post. There are plenty of those already.

If you’re looking for “here’s what actually happened, here’s why it was legal, and here’s where reasonable people might still feel uncomfortable about it,” keep reading.

The goal isn’t to convince you Blake Lively is perfect. It’s to show you that “legally proper but strategically aggressive” is a very different thing than “criminal conspiracy,” and right now, the online discourse has completely collapsed that distinction.

Let’s look at what actually happened.

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BACKGROUND: WHAT IS VANZAN?

Vanzan, Inc. is a New York company owned 50/50 by Blake Lively and Ryan Reynolds. Blake is the president; Ryan is the VP and CFO. It was formed in 2019 in New York. This is publicly available information. It is not connected to the Delaware Vanzan that was closed in the 2010s (sorry, sleuths).

What does it do? It handles payroll and administration for household employees—nannies, personal assistants, drivers, security, household staff.

And if you’re here to do the tired “Blake and Ryan said they don’t have nannies!!” gotcha? Knock it off. He said that once (right after their first baby) and it’s been clipped into infinity ever since. They’ve both publicly praised their team for years. They have four children. They both have multiple projects. No one has claimed they don’t have help. Keep up.

Why does this matter? Because all of these employees have nondisclosure agreements (NDAs). When you work for a celebrity household, you sign an agreement promising not to disclose confidential information.

Vanzan is the corporate entity that employs these people and manages these agreements. That’s it. It’s not some shadowy shell corporation.

Some Baldoni supporters have tried to claim Vanzan was a fake entity created just for this lawsuit—that it had no employees, no real business purpose, no contracts to be breached. The corporate representative deposition debunked this entirely. Justine Harris testified that Vanzan handles “payroll and other administrative matters for a variety of household employees” and that “a hundred percent of the employees who are paid through Vanzan have nondisclosure agreements.” Vanzan is exactly what it claims to be: a legitimate business entity managing household employment.

So why did Vanzan become the center of online controversy? To understand that, you need to understand what happened in August 2024.

THE TIMELINE

August 2024: Blake Experiences Coordinated Attack

Throughout August 2024, Blake experiences what appears to be a sudden, coordinated backlash. Negative articles start appearing across multiple outlets. Social media is flooded with attacks calling her a “mean girl,” “difficult,” a “diva,” “tone-deaf.” The narrative is remarkably consistent across platforms.

Her haircare line sales plummet. The professional reputation she’s built over two decades is being systematically dismantled in real time.

Blake knows something is wrong. Sony knows something is wrong. Colleen Hoover knows something is wrong. WME knows something is wrong. Ryan Reynolds knows something is wrong.

This isn’t organic. This is coordinated.

But Blake doesn’t know who’s behind it, how it’s being orchestrated, who leaked information to make it possible, or what evidence exists. She has suspicions, I’m sure. But she does not know.

Late August 2024: Blake Learns There’s Evidence

According to Blake, her friend Ashley Avignon contacts her with concerning information. A woman named Stephanie Jones has been trying to reach Blake. Stephanie has messages on a work device showing what’s being done to Blake behind the scenes. Blake (presumably) knows that Jonewsorks used to be Baldoni’s PR rep.

What Blake knows at this point:

• There’s a coordinated campaign against her (she’s living it)

• Jonesworks has evidence of how it’s being orchestrated (Jones was likely preparing to sue her former employee, Jennifer Abel, for non-compete violations and theft of clients, and while imaging Abel’s phone, discovered what they were doing to Blake Lively)

• The messages are bad enough that a 20-30 year Celebrity PR veteran (Jones) was allegedly “sobbing” reading them

• Someone in her orbit must have leaked confidential information to enable this campaign

What Blake does NOT have at this point:

• The actual messages

• The documents

• Any proof she can use in court

• Any way to prove the coordination she’s experiencing

Stephanie had tried reaching Blake’s publicist Leslie Sloane first, but Leslie (allegedly) brushed her off. So Stephanie went through a mutual friend instead.

What Blake likely realizes: For the crisis PR campaign to be this effective and detailed, someone with access to confidential information about her must have either leaked that information to the crisis PR team OR known about the campaign and failed to warn her. Especially information about the set of It Ends With Us.

Who would have that access? People in her orbit with confidentiality obligations—household employees, contractors, agents who work for Vanzan and signed NDAs. She knows it could have also been someone she worked with on set (Baldoni). These are people who would have access to private information about Blake’s life, her family, her schedule, her business dealings, and details about what was happening on set.

The problem? Blake doesn’t know WHO.

September 27, 2024: The Solution? Vanzan Files a Lawsuit

Blake’s company, Vanzan, files a lawsuit in New York State Supreme Court against “John Does 1-10, inclusive” placeholder names for unknown defendants.

Why would she not sue the Does in her own name?

Instant headlines, instant hot takes. Now imagine if she’d filed in September 2024, while It Ends With Us was still in theaters and while the internet was speculating about a “feud on set.” Not good.

The whole point was to investigate. Blake knew someone was involved in this campaign. But who? Was it a household employee? A contractor? Someone else with access? Her employer? Baldoni? Sony?

Using Vanzan accomplished several things:

1. Vanzan is the entity that actually employs the household staff and holds the NDAs, so it had legal standing

2. A corporate lawsuit filed by “Vanzan, Inc. v. Does 1-10” doesn’t make headlines the way “Blake Lively Sues Unknown Defendants” would

3. It kept the investigation separate from Blake’s public profile during a crucial promotional period

4. It allowed discovery to figure out who the wrong-Doers (I had to) were before deciding whether to pursue them.

“But They Issued The Subpoena SO FAST After Filing!”

Yes, and that’s exactly what you’re supposed to do in a Doe lawsuit.

When you file a Doe lawsuit, you’re not filing because you already know everything, you’re filing because you don’t know, and you need discovery tools to find out. The clock starts ticking the moment you file. Every day you wait is a day that evidence could be destroyed, witnesses’ memories could fade, or the statute of limitations could run out on claims against the actual wrongdoers once you identify them.

In Doe cases, you file and immediately begin using discovery to identify the defendants. That’s not suspicious, that’s efficient lawyering. That is how you find the Does. That is looking for the Does. What would be the point of filing and then waiting weeks or months before starting your investigation?

“Sorry Your Honor, we filed this case to identify unknown wrongdoers, but we thought we’d just sit on it for a while before actually trying to find out who they are”?

The criticism seems to be: “They filed on September 27 and issued a subpoena on October 1—that’s only 4 days! They must have planned this!”

Well... yes. Of course they planned it.

That’s legal strategy. You prepare your subpoenas before filing so you can issue them immediately after. You don’t file a Doe lawsuit and then start from scratch figuring out your discovery plan. You know what evidence you need and where it likely is, so you can move quickly once the lawsuit gives you the legal authority to request it.

The speed isn’t evidence of impropriety, it’s evidence of competent legal work. Slow discovery in a Doe case isn’t more ethical; it’s just less effective.

Critics want it both ways: they complain that Doe lawsuits are “fishing expeditions,” but then when lawyers conduct targeted, efficient discovery they complain it’s “too fast” and “too specific.” You can’t have it both ways. Either Vanzan was investigating properly (targeted, quick, efficient) or they were fishing randomly (slow, broad, unfocused). They did the former, which is exactly what you want in a Doe case.

“But They Filed Just To Get Discovery!”

Yes. That’s literally the entire point of a Doe lawsuit.

When you file against unknown defendants, the only way to identify them is through discovery. You can’t just guess. You can’t just assume. You need to use legal tools like subpoenas to gather evidence that reveals who the Does actually are.

Think about it logically: If Blake suspected someone in her orbit leaked confidential information but didn’t know who, how else would she find out? She can’t call up every employee and contractor or boss on site and ask “Hey, did you leak my private information to a crisis PR firm?” or “were you part of a smear campaign against me?”

The whole point of filing the Doe lawsuit is to unlock discovery tools that let you investigate.

The complaint doesn’t need to name specific defendants because that’s what you’re trying to find out. The subpoena is detailed because that’s how you gather the evidence to identify them. This isn’t a loophole or a trick, it’s the investigative phase working exactly as designed.

Critics act like using discovery to identify Does is somehow improper. But what’s the alternative? You can only sue people you already know harmed you? Then what’s the point of allowing Doe lawsuits at all? The entire purpose of the Doe procedure is: “I know I was harmed, I don’t know by whom, so I’m filing this lawsuit to use discovery to find out.”

That’s not abuse of process. That’s the process.

The real question isn’t “why so fast?” It’s “why would you wait?”

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WHAT THE COMPLAINT ALLEGED

From the actual filing:

“This action arises out of an ongoing campaign to damage Plaintiff’s business and Plaintiff’s reputation.”

“In or around August 2024, the DOE Defendants breached [their duties] by acting in a manner that was inconsistent with, and damaging to, Plaintiff’s business interests and reputation.”

The complaint alleges the Does:

• Disclosed Vanzan’s confidential and private information to third parties

• Failed to inform Vanzan about conduct by third parties designed to cause irreparable harm

• Acted in bad faith and for their own benefit at Vanzan’s expense

The legal claims? Breach of Contract, Breach of Good Faith and Fair Dealing, and Faithless Servant (a New York law claim for when employees/agents betray their employer).

WHY SUE “JOHN DOES”?

Because Vanzan genuinely might not have known the specific identities of anyone who could have been part of this campaign or who could have been communicating about the campaign.

This is called a “Doe lawsuit” and it’s a standard legal tool. You use it when you know you’ve been harmed but you don’t know their specific identities or exactly how many people were involved. New York law explicitly permits this.

What does this look like?

Say someone steals confidential information from your company filing cabinet. You know it was one of your 10 employees (they’re the only ones with keys), but you don’t know which one. You can file against “Does 1-10” and use discovery to figure it out. You could issue non-party subpoenas to each of those 10 employees seeking information to help determine which ones might be the actual Does.

That’s not a loophole. That’s the legal system working as designed. Otherwise, you’d be stuck: can’t sue until you know who did it, but can’t find out without the legal tools (discovery) that come with filing a lawsuit, and then you might miss the deadline to actually sue (statute of limitations).

Here? If Blake knew or thought that someone in her orbit had leaked confidential information, she could issue subpoenas to third parties (like Jonesworks) to find out who was receiving or communicating about the information, who they were speaking to, and who might have been involved in the breach.

THE SUBPOENA

October-November 2024: Vanzan Issues a Subpoena

Once the lawsuit is filed, Vanzan has the legal right to conduct discovery—to gather evidence. One tool available is a third-party subpoena: a legal order requiring someone who’s not a party to produce documents or testify.

In New York, when you issue a subpoena you do NOT need the court to “approve it” if you have a pending lawsuit. If I serve a subpoena today, I need to provide a copy to the opposing party. That’s it. When there is no opposing party (like here, with Does), you don’t need to serve a copy of the subpoena to anyone other than the subpoenaed party (here, Jonesworks).

So Vanzan issued a subpoena to Jonesworks LLC (Stephanie Jones’ company) and served Jonesworks, through their attorneys.

“Wait, Couldn’t Jonesworks Just GIVE Blake the Documents?”

Legally? Yes, she likely could have (based on the publicly available facts). The documents were in Jonesworks’ possession, on a company device. But doing so without legal process would have been riskier for everyone involved. Jonesworks had a contract with Wayfarer (Baldoni’s company), and handing over documents without legal compulsion could have exposed Jones to claims of breach of contract or improper disclosure.

But with a subpoena:

• Jonesworks has legal compulsion to produce, HAD to comply

• Jonesworks has legal protection, they are following a court order

• Proper chain of custody

• Complete production (not just what’s on one phone - Lively requested all documents)

• Jonesworks had the opportunity to object (they didn’t)

Stephanie Jones appears to have been acting to expose misconduct. Who wanted to do this the RIGHT way. She could have leaked documents to TMZ. Instead, she reached out to let Blake know evidence existed, then waited for proper legal process.

What Did the Subpoena Request?

As shown above, the subpoena asked for documents concerning:

• Lively, Reynolds, their families, and their companies

• Instances of inappropriate conduct relating to sexual harassment or retaliation in connection with the film

• Allegations of such conduct

• Investigations or responses to such allegations

• Marketing and publicity efforts related to retaliatory efforts to disparage Lively/Reynolds

• Retaliatory actions taken in anticipation of public disclosures about harassment

The subpoena requests tie directly back to the Vanzan complaint’s allegations.

The complaint alleged: Does disclosed confidential information
The subpoena requested: Documents showing what was disclosed and to whom at Jonesworks

The complaint alleged: Does failed to warn about harmful conduct
The subpoena requested: Documents about the campaign and whether Does knew about it

This is targeted, proper discovery.

Jonesworks Could Have Objected—They Didn’t

When you receive a third-party subpoena, you have options:

• Object (too broad, not relevant, burdensome)

• Move to quash (ask court to block it)

• Notify interested parties

• Negotiate to narrow the scope

• Comply

Jonesworks complied. They didn’t object. They didn’t move to quash. They didn’t fight it. The information was in their possession on a device that belonged to Jonesworks. It was Jonesworks’ information.

Why not? Because the subpoena was properly issued, reasonably limited in scope, relevant to the allegations, not seeking privileged material, and not overly burdensome.

If the subpoena were improper, Jonesworks’ lawyers would have objected.

“Should Jonesworks Have Notified Baldoni?”

Some Baldoni defenders argue that Jonesworks should have notified Baldoni and/or Wayfarer before complying with the subpoena. This argument falls apart for many reasons.

First, Baldoni’s based on publicly available contract language, Jonesworks could disclose information “required by law or a court of competent jurisdiction.” A subpoena is exactly that, a requirement by a court of competent jurisdiction. The contract Baldoni’s team signed allowed for exactly what happened.

Second, third parties receiving subpoenas have no independent legal obligation to alert the people whose information is being sought. Could they? Sure. Must they? No. Your information could unknowingly be produced.

Third, by the time the subpoena arrived, Baldoni had (allegedly) encouraged Jennifer Abel (Jones’ employee) to leave Jonesworks, left Jonesworks himself with Abel, set up competing services with Abel, and refused to pay money he still owed. From the Jones v. Abel amended complaint: “Wayfarer and Baldoni breached their own contract with Jonesworks and then poured salt in the wound by baselessly refusing to pay the remaining amount owed.”

So Baldoni wants to claim Jonesworks violated obligations to him while he was actively breaching his obligations to them?

Fourth, when Jonesworks examined Abel’s company phone after terminating her, she (allegedly) found that Abel was running smear campaigns using Jonesworks’ resources, had stolen over 70 proprietary documents, and was actively trying to destroy Jonesworks from within. Jonesworks owed Baldoni and Abel nothing at this point.

The retaliation Stephanie faced?

After complying with the subpoena, Baldoni’s team (allegedly) launched a smear campaign against Stephanie Jones, falsely claiming the messages were obtained without a subpoena, then that they were doctored (they weren’t, they were forensically extracted from Abel’s company phone), then that they were obtained illicitly (they weren’t, the phone was company property properly returned to Jonesworks), and that Stephanie Jones was the bad actor (she wasn’t).

Even if Baldoni or Abel had been notified about the subpoena, they couldn’t have stopped it.

What would the objection have been?

That the documents were not relevant to the subpoena? They were.

That they were not in Jonesworks’ possession? They were.

That they showed work communications about their conduct? They did.

“These documents make me look bad” isn’t a legal basis to quash a subpoena.

Baldoni had no legal grounds to block production, which is probably why the argument has shifted to claiming Jones should have warned him, because that’s literally the only thing left to complain about.

When Blake Actually Got the Documents

She didn’t have the evidence when she filed the Vanzan suit. She filed the lawsuit, issued the subpoena, and then (through proper legal process) received the documents.

That’s exactly how this is supposed to work.

WHAT THE DOCUMENTS SHOWED

When Jonesworks complied, they produced documents including:

• Communications between Jen Abel and the crisis PR team

• Messages showing plans to “bury” Blake

• Coordination with Baldoni’s team

• Strategy documents about damaging Blake’s reputation and her onset complaints

• Timeline showing it began in July/August 2024

• Even WORSE communications about what they were doing to Stephanie Jones (but that’s for a future post)

Despite Abel's allegations that Jones improperly accessed personal documents, the publicly available information suggests the Vanzan subpoena produced work-related communications on a company device about a work project (the crisis PR campaign).

THE VOLUNTARY DISMISSAL

December 2024: After obtaining the documents, Vanzan voluntarily dismissed the Doe lawsuit without prejudice.

“SEE? It was a sham!”

No. The purpose of a Doe lawsuit is to:

• Preserve claims before statute of limitations runs out

• Use discovery to identify unknown wrongdoers

• Gather evidence about what happened

Once you’ve accomplished those purposes, you either amend to name the specific Does and proceed against them, OR dismiss because you got what you needed (and/or need to complete a procedural step, like filing a CRD complaint before filing a lawsuit against your employer).

Vanzan chose the second option because the documents revealed the people running the campaign (Baldoni, crisis PR) were more important targets. Obviously—he was her employer. The documents were very bad for Baldoni.

The Doe lawsuit had served its purpose:

• Identified the scope of the breach

• Obtained evidence of the retaliation campaign

• Proved confidential information was leaked

• Showed Lively what was happening to her

• Provided documents for the CRD complaint and federal case

THE CORPORATE REPRESENTATIVE DEPOSITION

“But Blake Refused to Testify!”

This is based on a complete misunderstanding of corporate depositions.

When a company gets sued or sues someone, the other side can take a corporate deposition, which is basically a deposition of the business itself. The company designates a corporate representative, someone knowledgeable about the topics in the 30(b)(6) notice, to testify on behalf of the company. The representative doesn’t have to be the CEO.

In this case, Vanzan designated lawyer Justine Harris as the corporate representative.

What did Harris testify about?

• Vanzan’s structure and purpose

• Blake’s role and authorizations as president

• Timeline of events

• Document production

• That Vanzan had no direct communications with Stephanie Jones except through lawyers

Harris testified to every non-privileged fact.

When asked about specific investigation details, Harris (presumably) properly invoked attorney-client privilege, because those questions required disclosing attorney work product and legal strategy. However, that’s an assumption because I cannot see those pages of the deposition.

You don’t have to disclose your investigation strategy while investigating. That’s what privilege is for.

If they had made any improper privilege assertions, Wayfarer/Baldoni would have contacted the court. They didn’t. No record of it.

THE ACTUAL SCANDAL

While everyone’s screaming about Vanzan, here’s what we should be looking at:

Baldoni and his team used Signal with auto-delete (that they had to manually turn on) for Lively-related communications starting in August 2024. Even after they hired crisis PR. Even after they knew litigation was likely. Even after they had a legal duty to preserve evidence. They did not produce messages from August-December about the campaign. Some of those August messages may not have survived without this subpoena, given the Defendants’ failure to produce evidence from this period.

This is called spoliation. The intentional destruction of evidence.

Courts can impose sanctions:

• Adverse inference (jury told to assume destroyed evidence was unfavorable)

• Monetary sanctions

• Preclusion of evidence or defenses

Blake has filed a motion for spoliation sanctions. The court is currently considering it.

WHY THE CRITICISM DOESN’T HOLD UP

“It Was a Sham to Get Discovery”
That’s literally what Doe lawsuits are for. You file to investigate and gather evidence. That’s the tool working as designed.

“Blake Should Have Notified Baldoni”
Blake had no obligation to notify anyone other than the subpoenaed party.

“Blake Already Had the Documents”
No, she didn’t. There is no information that suggests she did.

“But Jones WANTED to Give Blake the Documents, That Makes It a Sham!”

So what? Wanting to expose wrongdoing doesn’t make disclosure unethical.

The fact that Jones (may have) wanted to help Blake doesn’t make the subpoena improper any more than:

• A victim wanting to cooperate with police makes their testimony invalid

• A former employee wanting to expose fraud makes their documents inadmissible

• A witness wanting to tell the truth makes their testimony suspect

Wanting to do the right thing doesn’t make it wrong.

The subpoena gave Jones legal protection against contract claims, ensured proper chain of custody, and required complete production rather than selective leaking. That’s doing it the RIGHT way.

A “friendly subpoena” isn’t improper, it just means the legal process worked. Would critics prefer Jones had fought to protect people running (alleged) smear campaigns?

“The Subpoena Was Too Broad”
If it were too broad, Jonesworks would have objected. They didn’t. They complied voluntarily.

“Blake Refused to Testify”
Blake’s company designated a corporate representative, which is standard procedure for a 30(b)(6) deposition. Blake was separately deposed in the federal case and asked questions about how she came to know about these texts.

“The Dismissal Proves It Was Fake”
Voluntary dismissal after obtaining necessary information is completely normal in Doe lawsuits.

“Blake’s Lawyers Are Unethical”
By what ethical standard? There's no publicly available evidence they violated any rules. They followed proper procedures at every documented step.

THE REAL LESSONS

When you’re harmed but don’t know exactly who’s responsible, you can file a Doe lawsuit, use discovery to investigate, and then proceed accordingly. This is the system functioning as designed.

The fact that we’re scrutinizing Blake’s proper use of legal tools while largely ignoring Baldoni’s destruction of evidence shows how skewed the discourse has become.

Even if Blake had never filed the Vanzan lawsuit, she would be entitled to these exact same documents in federal discovery anyway. Baldoni’s communications with crisis PR about “burying” Blake are relevant to her retaliation and defamation claims. Under Federal Rule of Civil Procedure 26, Baldoni had to produce these documents either way.

The Vanzan lawsuit just obtained them earlier through a lawful parallel track, and may have saved crucial evidence. Without it, would these documents have been deleted like the Signal messages Baldoni’s team destroyed?

Strategic? Yes.

Aggressive? Also yes.

Improper? That’s where reasonable people disagree.

Illegal? No.

The Vanzan lawsuit used every procedural tool available to sophisticated litigants. Those tools exist for everyone in theory, but not everyone can deploy them in practice. That disparity is worth acknowledging even if Blake’s use of those tools was proper.

The next time someone screams “VANZAN!” at you like it proves something nefarious, you can calmly respond:

“Oh, you mean the standard Doe lawsuit that properly investigated a confidentiality breach, used targeted subpoenas that third parties complied with voluntarily, obtained evidence that proved the allegations true, and was dismissed after accomplishing its purpose? Yeah, that’s just normal civil procedure. Want to talk about the evidence destruction instead?”

A FINAL NOTE

For those preparing to tell me I have no idea what I’m talking about: I scored an A+ in New York Practice/CPLR back in law school. You know, the class that’s literally just studying New York civil procedure—including Doe lawsuits, discovery, and subpoenas.

And yes, I knew mentioning my grade would make certain people lose their minds. I was right. Some anonymous lawyer is currently having a meltdown about me posting a grade from 2019.

Thanks for reading. Now go forth and respond calmly the next time someone screams “VANZAN!” at you.

If you would like additional resources on the subject, feel free to comment!

© More with MJ 2025. All rights reserved.

In Part One, we covered how Judge Liman shredded Justin Baldoni’s $400 million lawsuit like it was a rejected It Ends With Us rewrite.

Civil extortion? Gone. Defamation? Not even close. Leslie Sloane, Vision PR and the New York Times? Out of the case entirely. Blake Lively? Still standing, with her retaliation allegations acknowledged and even a little bit validated…

But somehow, there is still more. This snarky edit is brought to you by a mother trying to run a law firm from her laptop with a sick child, so I am sorry, it is a bit, um, extra today.

In today’s episode of Celebrity Lawsuits That Feel Like a Group Project Gone Wrong, we dive into:

• Why Baldoni’s false light claim failed harder than me trying to work with a sick child.

• How the court reacted to vague allegations about “threats” and “creative control” in a world where “hard bargaining” is practically a love language.

• The attempted lawsuit against the New York Times for… publishing before noon (yes, really).

• And what happens when you try to sneak back into court by dressing up your defamation claim in a different outfit and calling it a whole new tort.

Spoiler: Judge Liman did not buy the wardrobe change.

We’ll also talk about the two very specific claims the judge is allowing Baldoni’s team to try amending (and why the odds still don’t look great there).

Part 1: False Light Claims: When You Try to Rebrand Your Flop Lawsuit

At this point in the ruling, Judge Liman had already dismissed Baldoni's defamation and civil extortion claims with the energy of someone deleting unread emails. But the Wayfarer legal team wasn't done yet.

Enter: the false light claim.

If defamation is saying something untrue that ruins your reputation, false light is saying something technically true (or at least neutral) but in a way that paints you in a wildly misleading, reputation-destroying spotlight. Think of it as the tort equivalent of telling your friend's new partner: "Oh, you didn't know they used to date their boss?" Not wrong, just… reputationally lethal. And rude.

What is False Light?

False light invasion of privacy is defamation's slightly different cousin that protects against having your reputation distorted in misleading ways. Under California law, a false light claim requires proving:

1. Publicity that places the plaintiff in a false light

2. The false light is "highly offensive to a reasonable person"

3. The defendant knew or acted with reckless disregard as to the falsity

As the court explained, false light and defamation have "substantial overlap in the interests protected." But here's the catch: it walks hand-in-hand with defamation requirements, and in this case, they both tripped over the same legal wire.

The Judge's Ruling: "Nice Try, Still Not Legal"

The Wayfarer Parties tried to argue that Lively, Reynolds, and Sloane didn't just make false statements they distorted true ones. Specifically, they claimed Lively and her team "selectively and deceptively edited" text messages to portray Baldoni as the mastermind behind a smear campaign.

And Judge Liman's response?

"Those factual allegations simply allege in different words the same conduct that is alleged to constitute defamation."

He continued, "The Wayfarer Parties cannot benefit by the expedient of simply relabeling their defamation claim as false light."

Translation: You can't slap a wig and sunglasses on a failed defamation claim and pretend it's a new tort. We see you.

Same Problems, Same Result

Even if we set aside the relabeling issue, the court found the same three strikes that doomed the defamation claim also applied here:

1. The CRD complaint was privileged meaning Lively's legal filings, even if quoted in the media, are protected by law

2. Claims about "selective editing" were conclusory no actual facts provided to support the allegations

3. No actual malice was shown a requirement when suing public figures

The court noted that the plaintiffs themselves "concede that the false light claim stands or falls based on 'whether it meets the same requirements as the defamation cause of action.'"

So yes, even they kind of admitted this was a copy-paste job with a new heading.

And the Times? They're in New York. False Light DOES NOT Even Exist There.

As if things weren't bleak enough for the plaintiffs, Judge Liman hit them with one final blow:

"New York does not recognize the tort of false light invasion of privacy."

Meaning? You can't sue the New York Times for false light in New York. The tort doesn't even legally exist in that jurisdiction. It’s true, I am here. We learned that in law school.

The Strategic Lesson

This part of the ruling illustrates why sometimes lawyers focus on fewer, stronger claims (or they withdraw claims, cough Blake’s team, cough) rather than throwing everything at the wall. You can't solve fundamental legal problems by adding more claims based on the same facts.

Baldoni's team appeared to recognize their defamation claims were weak, so they tried to create an alternative path to victory through false light. But since both claims were based on the same underlying conduct and required proving similar elements, the false light claim inherited all the same fatal flaws.

The court basically said, if your facts don't support defamation, they don't support false light either, because you're describing the same actions.

Part 2: The Implied Covenant of Good Faith: Or, How to Sue Someone for Ruining Your VIBE

Ah yes, the good ol' implied covenant of good faith and fair dealing, legal speak for: "You promised to be chill, and you were the opposite of chill."

My dog regularly promises to be chill. She never is.

This was the Wayfarer Parties' next big swing at Blake Lively. The argument? That she "seized creative control" of It Ends With Us, made threats, and deprived them of the sacred right to make the movie they envisioned.

In legal terms, they claimed she breached the implied covenant by making it impossible for them to receive the benefits of the contract she allegedly signed.

But here's the kicker: She didn't sign the contract.

Yes. Really. Their own complaint admits this multiple times. So let's break down why this claim got tossed faster than a Netflix rom-com idea starring someone's cousin's TikTok influencer boyfriend.

What Is the Implied Covenant of Good Faith?

Every contract under California law comes with a bonus clause (and most states) that says neither party can act in a way that screws the other side out of the deal they agreed to.

As the court explained: California recognizes "an implied covenant of good faith and fair dealing in every contract that neither party will do anything which will injure the right of the other to receive the benefits of the agreement."

Sounds reasonable, right? Don't be a jerk. Don't sabotage the deal. But the law's clear: this covenant "cannot impose substantive duties or limits on the contracting parties beyond those incorporated in the specific terms of their agreement."

So if you're going to claim a breach of this covenant, you have to:

1. Identify a real contract

2. Point to a specific obligation that got blocked or undermined

The court noted that "to state a claim for breach of the implied covenant of good faith and fair dealing, Plaintiff must allege: (1) the existence of some specific contractual obligation; and (2) interference with plaintiff's performance of the contract or failure to cooperate with the plaintiff."

Seems simple enough. Unless, again, the contract was never signed.

Judge Liman's Take: You Can't Break a Contract That Doesn't Exist

The court was not having it: "The Wayfarer Parties do not plead the terms of a relevant contract, which of the Wayfarer Parties it was with, or when it was made."

Instead, the complaint was full of vague references. Negotiations. Entitlements. Aspirations.

The court found the complaint contained "vague references to contract negotiations or entitlements," but "also indicates several times that Lively did not sign her employment contract for the Film."

And here's where it really fell apart: they tried to fix it in their opposition brief (the legal version of saying "Wait wait wait! Actually here's what we meant...").

Judge Liman shut that down too: "The [c]omplaint cannot be amended by the briefs in opposition to a motion to dismiss."

Translation: You had your chance to write it down. This isn't improv court.

But What About the Spirit of the Agreement?

The Wayfarer Parties seem to think they were spiritually married to Lively's cooperation, and when she allegedly withheld it, that violated the "essence" of the agreement.

Here's the problem: if she didn't sign anything, there was no essence to violate.

The court was crystal clear about what was missing: "The Wayfarer Parties do not allege any particular contractual provision that gave any particular Wayfarer Party to 'the opportunity to produce, edit, and market' the film or that prohibited Lively from involvement in the production, editing or marketing of the film."

In other words: "They therefore do not identify any contractual provision the exercise of which Lively frustrated."

You cannot sue someone for failing to uphold promises they never legally agreed to. And even if she had signed, you'd still need to show what term in the contract prohibited her alleged conduct.

Spoiler: they didn't.

Bottom Line

The court's requirement that plaintiffs "identify the specific contractual provision that was frustrated" exposed the fundamental flaw in their legal theory: you can't breach the implied covenant of good faith when there's no underlying agreement to be “good” about.

It's like getting mad at your neighbor for not following your imaginary HOA rules. Like my neighbor. When my kids leave their bikes in the front yard.

The breach of implied covenant claim was dismissed.

Part 3: Tortious Interference. Pronounced Torshus Interfernce/Intentional Interference with Contractual Relations

This was another swing-and-a-miss. The Wayfarer team claimed that Blake Lively and Ryan Reynolds tortiously interfered with Baldoni's relationship with his talent agency, WME, by allegedly calling him a "sexual predator" and demanding the agency drop him.

Sounds dramatic, right? The problem is that tortious interference claims require big facts. And as Judge Liman would make clear, the Wayfarer team did not allege them.

What Is Tortious Interference?

Under California law, there are actually three different versions of this claim, each with specific requirements:

Interference with a contract requires:

1. A valid contract existed

2. The defendant knew about it

3. They intentionally disrupted it

4. The disruption actually happened

5. You lost money because of it

Interference with prospective economic advantage is similar, but for hoped-for relationships or deals that hadn't happened yet. Plus, as the court noted, "the plaintiff must plead that the defendant engaged in an act that is wrongful apart from the interference itself."

Negligent interference requires showing "the defendant owes the plaintiff a duty of care" which is a big legal ask when you're talking about Hollywood A-listers trash-talking each other.

What Did Wayfarer Actually Allege?

Here's what they said happened:

• WME was Baldoni's agency

• Lively and Reynolds were also repped by WME

• Reynolds allegedly told WME that Baldoni was a "sexual predator" and told them to drop him

So far, that's just one big "he said, she said" with some added celebrity drama. But legally, that's not enough.

Why? Because as Judge Liman noted, quoting Supreme Court precedent: "A formulaic recitation of the elements of a cause of action will not do."

You can't just copy-paste the elements of a tort and hope the judge will fill in the blanks.

Here's What Was Missing

1. No Specific Contract - The court found they "do not allege that they had contract with WME the breach of which Reynolds knowingly induced." This is a fatal problem when you're suing over interference with a contract. You need to actually identify WHAT contract was interfered with.

2. No Actual Interference - Even if Reynolds said something rude, they "fail to allege that WME was influenced by Reynolds' statements in any way, aside from conclusory statements that WME 'cease[d] performing,' the relationship was 'disrupted,' or the Wayfarer parties 'were harmed.'"

Which... performing what? Unclear. The court noted this was just formulaic language without actual facts.

3. No Independently Wrongful Act - Here's where their failed defamation claim came back to haunt them. The court noted: "because the Wayfarer Parties do not allege that Reynolds' statements were defamatory, they do not allege that they were independently wrongful."

Since Reynolds' alleged "sexual predator" comment wasn't legally defamatory (per the earlier ruling), it wasn't LEGALLY wrongful. Under California law, just being mean isn't enough, you need to break a law.

4. No Duty of Care = No Negligence Claim - The negligence version of this claim was basically a throw-in, and the Wayfarer team straight-up admitted they had no duty of care to point to. As the court noted: "the Wayfarer Parties admittedly do not allege a duty of care to support the negligence claim."

Judge Liman might as well have said: "Why are we even talking about this?"

If there's no specific contract, no actual disruption, and no clear legal wrong, then what you've got is a gossip session, not a tort.

The Bottom Line?

These interference claims were the legal equivalent of somebody might have been mad about something at some point and somebody might have been rude.

The court systematically dismantled each version:

• Contract interference: No specific contract identified

• Prospective advantage: No independently wrongful act

• Negligent interference: No duty of care alleged

Judge Liman was having none of it. All three interference claims were dismissed.

Part 4: Promissory Fraud and Breach of Contract AKA When You Try to Sue a Newspaper for Publishing Early

Here's where things got truly weird for the Wayfarer legal team. They decided to sue The New York Times for... wait for it... publishing an article before noon.

And if you are on Reddit, you probably wondered if this was a good idea.

Yes, really.

Here's what happened:

• On December 20, 2024, at 9:40 p.m., a Times reporter emailed the Wayfarer parties asking for comment

• The email said: "We need to hear back from you tomorrow by noon Eastern"

• Baldoni's team responded at 2:16 a.m. with their statement

• The Times published the article at 10:11 a.m. on December 21st, before the noon deadline

Wayfarer's legal theory? The Times FRAUDULENTLY promised to wait until noon and breached an implied contract by publishing early.

What These Claims Actually Require

Promissory fraud requires proving: misrepresentation, knowledge of falsity, intent to defraud, justifiable reliance, and resulting damage.

Breach of implied contract requires: existence of a contract, performance by plaintiff, breach by defendant, and damages.

Sounds straightforward, except for one tiny problem...

Judge Liman's Reality Check…

The court systematically destroyed both claims:

No Contract Existed: "The emails do not constitute a contract. There is no offer, no acceptance, and no consideration."

The court noted the email "sets a deadline of noon Eastern for comment, but it does not offer to hold publication in exchange for anything."

The "Contract" Makes No Sense: "The Wayfarer Parties' theory is apparently that by sending their comment, they accepted an offer from the Times that they would have until noon the next day to comment. But this makes little sense, because once the Times had the Wayfarer Parties' comment it would not need to wait until noon for an additional comment."

Even If There Was a Contract, It Was Satisfied: "The Times' email can be read, at most, to state that if a comment was provided before noon, it would be considered by the Times. A comment was provided and the Times considered it, including it in the Article. There was no breach."

The Fraud Claim Was Even Worse

For the promissory fraud claim, the court found: "The Times did not promise to withhold publication after receiving comments."

More damaging: "No facts are pleaded to support that the Wayfarer Parties relied on the alleged representation that they had until noon to submit comments or were injured by the belief that they had until noon rather than until 10:11 a.m. to provide comment which they had already provided at 2:16 a.m."

The court's final blow: "The Wayfarer Parties do not allege any further response they could have or actually would have made between 10:11 a.m. and noon had the Article not been published."

Bottom Line

This was borderline frivolous. The court essentially said: "You got exactly what you asked for. The Times requested comment by noon, you provided it at 2:16 a.m., and they included it in their article. What's the problem?"

A request for information before a certain time is not a contract. And you can't claim fraud when you received exactly what was promised: consideration of your timely-submitted comments.

This felt less like legitimate legal claims and more like a desperate attempt to find something (anything) to sue the Times for. When your strongest remaining argument is "they published two hours before they said they might," you've probably already lost?

Both claims were dismissed.

Part 5: And that, my friends, is how you lose on a motion to dismiss.

False light? Gone. Tortious interference? No contracts, no duty, no dice. Good faith and fair dealing? Hard to breach a vibe when there’s no signed agreement. And suing The New York Times for publishing before noon? Judge Liman basically laughed in his opinion.

But here’s the part that even surprised me: Justin Baldoni’s lawyers insist they can fix four of these claims. Not all. Not most. Just four. (Which four? Why do they think that when he said two? We’ll get into that.)

Judge Liman gave them permission to try again on a limited set of theories, though he made clear this wasn’t a green light so much as a fine, one more shot, but don’t waste my time.

Why would they want to amend? What exactly do they think they can salvage? And is it even worth it?

We’ll get into all of that, and the strategic reasons behind amendments in Part Three, coming shortly. Maybe even in audio form, because typing with a sick kid half on my lap is starting to feel like its own legal challenge.

Thank you for reading, thank you for sharing, and thank you for your patience. You all make this chaos worth documenting.

Stay tuned.

On Monday June 9, Federal Judge Lewis J. Liman delivered a 132-page ruling on four motions to dismiss. The result? He dismissed every claim in Justin Baldoni's $400 million lawsuit against Blake Lively, Ryan Reynolds, and The New York Times.

If you are just here for the summary: Out of a HUGE lawsuit with multiple claims against five defendants, all claims were dismissed. Baldoni can file an amended complaint and salvage exactly two claims BUT the judge seemed skeptical even those would survive. The New York Times and Blake Lively’s publicist Leslie Sloane are completely out of the case. Ryan Reynolds is mostly cleared. And Blake Lively's core argument (that she was retaliated against for reporting workplace harassment) has been acknowledged by a federal court.

Understanding the Legal Framework: What We're Actually Reading

Before getting into this, I need to explain something crucial about how courts work that most people don't understand. When someone gets sued, they can ask the judge to throw out the lawsuit immediately by filing what's called a "motion to dismiss." They're essentially arguing "even if everything the other side claims is true, they still don't have a valid legal case." That is what the New York Times, Ryan Reynolds, Blake Lively, and Leslie Sloane filed.

But there's a specific legal test the judge must apply. To survive a motion to dismiss, a complaint must include "sufficient factual matter, accepted as true, to 'state a claim to relief that is plausible on its face.'" The complaint must offer more than just "labels and conclusions" or "naked assertions" without factual support. As the Supreme Court has explained, the ultimate question is whether "the plaintiff pleads factual content that allows the court to draw the reasonable inference that the defendant is liable for the misconduct alleged."

In plain English: The judge has to assume everything the person suing says is completely true, even if it sounds unbelievable or one-sided. But even accepting all those "facts," the legal claims still have to make sense under the law. The question isn't "did this really happen?" but rather "even if everything you're claiming is accurate, have you described conduct that actually violates the law in a way that would justify a lawsuit?"

This is called the "plausibility" standard. The court needs "enough fact to raise a reasonable expectation that discovery will reveal evidence supporting the claim." It's not enough to just say "they defamed me" or "they extorted me" you have to describe specific facts that, if true, would actually constitute defamation or extortion under the law.

Why this weird rule? Because the question isn't "did this really happen?" The question is "even if everything you're claiming is true, do you have a valid legal case?"

Judge Liman was very explicit about this. He wrote:

"For purposes of this motion, the Court accepts as true the well-pleaded allegations of the Wayfarer Parties' Amended Complaint...Accordingly, the narrative set out below 'do[es] not reflect the Court's own findings' but simply repeats the account of events stated by the Wayfarer Parties in their Amended Complaint...At this stage of proceedings, the Court has not considered whether the allegations in the Amended Complaint are true."

This makes the ruling pretty devastating for Baldoni.

The judge essentially said: I'm going to assume every single thing you claim happened exactly as you describe it. But even giving you that enormous benefit of the doubt, the legal theories you're advancing do not hold water under established law. Your claims fail not because I don't believe you, but because what you're describing (even if completely accurate) doesn't constitute the legal violations you have claimed.

OKAY - with that context in mind, let's examine the story Baldoni and co. told the court, and why even his own version of events couldn't save his $400 million lawsuit..

Part 1: Documents the Judge Considered (And Why)

The judge didn't just look at Baldoni's 224-page complaint. Under legal rules designed to prevent tricky drafting, when a complaint extensively quotes from or relies heavily on outside documents, those documents become part of the case. Here's what Judge Liman considered:

Documents Included:

• The New York Times Article - Because Justin Baldoni's defamation claims were specifically about this article and he quoted from it extensively

• The New York Times Video - Accompanied the article and was central to Baldoni's defamation claims

• Blake Lively's California Civil Rights Department (CRD) Complaint - Justin Baldoni quoted from it extensively and claimed it was defamatory

• Blake Lively's "Seventeen Demands" List - The workplace protections Blake Lively demanded before returning to filming, which Baldoni claimed were extortionate

• Emails Between The New York Times and Baldoni's Team - Justin Baldoni claimed these emails created a contract that the Times breached

Document EXCLUDED:

• Exhibit A (168-page "Timeline") - Judge Liman refused to consider this massive additional document

• Why does this matters? Baldoni tried to sneak in an extra 168 pages of allegations disguised as a "timeline," but the judge saw right through it. The court noted this was just "an additional narrative summary" that didn't follow proper legal formatting and would "eviscerate" the requirement for clear, numbered allegations. Courts prevent plaintiffs from making complaints "invulnerable at the motion to dismiss stage purely by clever drafting." You can't just attach massive documents full of additional claims and hope the judge considers them.

Even with access to all the key documents Justin Baldoni relied on, including the very articles and complaints he claimed were defamatory, the judge still found his legal theories failed completely.

Part 2: The Procedural Chess Match

Understanding the timeline of filings reveals the strategic maneuvering that led to this comprehensive dismissal. This was a complex legal chess match with multiple parties, consolidated cases, and carefully (likely strategically) timed motions.

The Chess Moves in the SDNY

December 31, 2024: Blake Lively strikes first, filing her lawsuit against Baldoni and the Wayfarer parties in federal court. Her claims: sexual harassment, retaliation, breach of contract, and intentional and negligent infliction of emotional distress.

January 16, 2025: Baldoni fires back with his own lawsuit, which includes Ryan Reynolds, Vision PR and Leslie Sloane, but notably, The New York Times isn't included yet.

January 30, 2025: Judge Liman consolidates both cases. Neither side objected, which makes sense, having related claims scattered across multiple courts would be inefficient and potentially create conflicting rulings.

The Strategic Addition

January 31, 2025: One day after consolidation, Baldoni files an amended complaint adding The New York Times as a defendant. This timing matters, it shows Baldoni's team was already planning to expand their legal attack but waited until the cases were consolidated.

The court notes that Baldoni had previously sued the Times in California, but dismissed that suit after adding them to the New York case.

The Motions to Dismiss

What happened next was a coordinated defense strategy that ultimately proved devastating for Baldoni’s case:

February 20, 2025: Leslie Sloane and Vision PR file the first motion to dismiss, setting the template for the defense strategy.

February 28, 2025: The New York Times follows with their motion to dismiss, including twelve exhibits and successfully obtaining a stay of discovery. This discovery stay was big, it prevented Baldoni from using the discovery process to harass the Times while the legal theories were being tested.

March 18, 2025: Ryan Reynolds files his motion to dismiss.

March 20, 2025: Blake Lively files her motion to dismiss.

Baldoni's Last Stand

Throughout March and April 2025, Baldoni's team filed opposition briefs trying to save their claims. But a big detail emerged on April 15, 2025: Baldoni's team notifies the court they won't be amending their complaint by the court's deadline, but they preserve the right to ask for amendments if the motions to dismiss are granted.

What this reveals: It seems like Baldoni's lawyers knew they were in trouble. By trying to preserve amendment rights, they were essentially admitting their current complaint was likely inadequate but hoping they could fix it if given another chance.

The Significance

This procedural timeline reveals a….lot:

1. Coordinated Defense: All defendants filed motions to dismiss rather than trying to defend on the merits, suggesting they all recognized Baldoni's legal theories were fundamentally flawed.

2. Discovery Stays: The Times successfully obtained a discovery stay, preventing Baldoni from using expensive and time-consuming discovery as a weapon while the core legal issues were resolved.

3. Amendment Strategy: Baldoni's decision to preserve amendment rights rather than actually amend before the deadline suggests his lawyers knew the complaint was likely doomed but weren't sure how to fix it. Their statements to the press suggested they did not see the point of filing a motion to dismiss.

What the Procedural History Told Us?

Even before Judge Liman ruled on the substance, the procedural maneuvering revealed the weakness of Baldoni's position. When every defendant files a motion to dismiss, and when you're already planning amendments before the court rules, it suggests the legal theories underlying your $400 million lawsuit may not be as solid as you had initially hoped.

Part 3: Which Law Applies to Which Claims

The choice of law analysis reveals a strategic problem for Baldoni, different defendants got the benefit of different state laws, and some of those laws were more protective than others.

California Law Applied To:

• All claims against Blake Lively (parties agreed)

• All claims against Sloane and Reynolds (For Sloane and Reynolds, the court said it would analyze under California law "for purposes of this motion" because it couldn't determine where the relevant events occurred, but this could change later with more factual development)

New York Law Applied To:

• Defamation and false light claims against The New York Times (because the Times is based in New York, statements originated there, and New York has strong policy interests in regulating its media)

Why This Mattered:

New York law was more protective for the Lively Parties:

• No civil extortion claims allowed (not recognized under NY law)

• No false light invasion of privacy (not recognized under NY law)

• No negligent interference with economic relations (not recognized under NY law)

• Stronger protections for opinion statements

California law was less protective but still had key defenses:

• Sexual harassment complaint privilege (California Civil Code § 47.1 - enacted after #MeToo, not applied here)

• Litigation privilege for court filings

• Fair report privilege for media reporting

Even under the more plaintiff-friendly California law, Baldoni's claims still failed completely. This made the dismissal even worse, he didn’t win when the law was theoretically more favorable to his position.

Part 4: The Group Pleading Problem: Death by a Thousand Vague Allegations

Yes, you can sing that one. All defendants complained that Baldoni's 224-page complaint was too vague and confusing to defend against. They had a point.

What Group Pleading Means:

Instead of saying "Blake Lively did X on Y date," Baldoni's complaint constantly referred to "the Lively Parties" doing things, leaving defendants unable to figure out who specifically was supposed to have done what.

Courts require "fair notice of what the plaintiff's claim is and the ground upon which it rests." A complaint can't be "so confused, ambiguous, vague, or otherwise unintelligible that its true substance, if any, is well disguised."

Judge Liman found that despite being "lengthy and repetitive" with "heavy reliance on group pleading," the core claims were still understandable:

• Civil extortion based on Lively refusing to promote the film unless she got creative control

• Defamation based on providing the CRD complaint to the Times and calling Baldoni a "sexual predator"

• The Times reporting on an alleged "smear campaign"

The Court's Solution:

Judge Liman essentially said, I'll only consider the claims that are clear enough for defendants to understand and defend against. Everything else gets ignored.

Translation: "If you can't be bothered to clearly explain what you're suing someone for, I can't be bothered to guess what you meant."

The Strategic Backfire:

Baldoni's lawyers probably thought burying defendants in 224 pages of allegations would overwhelm them. Instead, it just made the judge focus only on the clearest claims, which happened to be the ones most easily dismissed under established law.

Bottom line: Sometimes less is more in legal pleading. Baldoni's kitchen-sink approach may have actually hurt his case by diluting his strongest arguments in a sea of vague group allegations.

Part 5: Bye Bye Extortion: What Even is Civil Extortion?

This claim was filed against all of the above. But what even is it?

Think of civil extortion as the legal version of "pay up or else." Under California law, it's when someone threatens you to force you to give them money or something valuable. However, it's not enough that someone just made a threat, you have to actually lose something because of that threat.

As the court explained, civil extortion under California law is "essentially a cause of action for moneys obtained by duress, a form of fraud." The key requirements are:

• A wrongful threat that would constitute "duress"

• The victim actually gave in to the threat

• The victim suffered actual financial damages as a result

Why This Case Failed

The court dismissed the extortion claims for several reasons:

1. No Real Damages

The biggest problem was that the plaintiffs couldn't show they actually lost money. The court noted that "a civil plaintiff cannot recover simply for being threatened." In several instances, they simply refused the demands entirely. The court stated: "there was no reliance on the threat, the Wayfarer Parties did not give up anything to Reynolds or Lively, and 'plaintiff did not sustain damages cognizable in a cause of action for duress.'"

2. The Threats Weren't "Wrongful"

Most of the alleged threats involved an actress saying she wouldn't do certain work unless conditions changed. The court found these were essentially contract negotiations, not extortion.

The judge explained: "A refusal to provide that which one has no obligation to provide is not a threat; it is a bargaining position." The court noted that the demands were "closely related to the conditions of her own performance" and largely involved workplace protections.

For contract-related disputes, the court emphasized that "not every statement that a party will stop performing a contract unless the conditions are changed or new consideration provided will give rise to a claim in tort for civil extortion."

3. Available Legal Remedies

The court noted that if someone truly breaches their contract, you can sue them for damages. As the judge wrote: "If, in fact, Lively announced that she would not perform unless the Wayfarer Parties gave something of value to her to which she was not entitled, the Wayfarer Parties could have sued. They were not without 'a reasonable alternative' to meeting Lively's demands."

The court added, "The fact that a plaintiff decides it is more financially beneficial to acquiesce to a demand than to sue does not mean the plaintiff lacks an adequate remedy in damages."

4. Vague Allegations

The court criticized the plaintiffs for making conclusory claims without providing specific facts about contracts or obligations. The judge noted they "do not allege facts showing that Lively had an obligation to promote the film or to approve marketing materials. They do not point to any contractual provisions, explain what Lively's contractual obligations were, or even explain what contract is being referenced."

The Legal Standard?

The court distinguished between legitimate business pressure and illegal extortion, explaining that courts look for "the wrongful exploitation of business exigencies to obtain disproportionate exchanges of value." The law protects against true coercion while allowing for "hard bargaining, 'efficient' breaches and reasonable settlements of good faith disputes."

The Bottom Line

Civil extortion requires more than hard-nosed business negotiations. The court said this seems like a business dispute where people drove hard bargains, not a case where anyone was actually extorted.

And the judge concluded: "Having made their decision, the Wayfarer Parties cannot now seek to recover in damages for what they would have obtained had they not agreed and had Lively promoted some different version of the film more consistent with the Wayfarer Parties' artistic vision."

Just because someone makes demands you don't like doesn't mean they're extorting you, especially if you have other legal options and don't actually lose money from their threats. The entertainment industry is known for difficult negotiations, and the law doesn't turn every heated contract dispute into a criminal matter.

The claim was dismissed with prejudice against all parties.

Part 6: Goodbye to the Defamation Claims

Defamation is making false statements that harm someone's reputation. Under California law, a plaintiff must prove five elements:

1. Publication - the statement was communicated to a third party

2. Falsity - the statement was false

3. Defamatory nature - the statement tends to injure reputation

4. Lack of privilege - no legal protection applies

5. Damages - actual harm or statements defamatory "per se"

Public figures, like Justin Baldoni, face a higher bar: They must prove "actual malice," meaning the defendant either knew the statement was false or acted with "reckless disregard for the truth."

As the court explained: "Public figures may prevail in a libel action only if they prove that the defendant's defamatory statements were made with actual malice, i.e., actual knowledge of falsehood or reckless disregard for the truth."

Claims Against Lively, Sloane, and Reynolds

Statements to The New York Times

The plaintiffs alleged these defendants conspired to feed false information to The New York Times about sexual harassment and a "smear campaign."

The court found the only plausible communication to the Times was providing Lively's official complaint to California's Civil Rights Department (CRD), which was legally privileged.

The court explained that California's "fair report privilege" protects sharing legal documents with the press, even before they're officially filed, as long as litigation was "actually contemplated seriously and in good faith." Since Lively did file her complaint and then sued in federal court, this requirement was met.

The judge noted: "The act of providing the CRD complaint to the Times is not sufficient to constitute defamation because the complaint is protected by the fair report privilege."

"Sexual Assault" and "Sexual Predator" Statements

The Claims:

• Sloane allegedly told a Daily Mail reporter that Lively was "sexually assaulted"

• Reynolds allegedly called Baldoni a "sexual predator" to entertainment industry executives

The court found no actual malice was adequately alleged.

Against Sloane: The court found that as Lively's publicist, Sloane had no firsthand knowledge of events and "no reason to believe that Lively was untruthful." Based on Lively's account in her legal complaint describing non-consensual physical contact, "Sloane had no duty to investigate" and could reasonably characterize such conduct as "sexual assault."

Against Reynolds: Similarly, Reynolds wasn't present during filming and had reasons to believe Lively's account. The court noted Reynolds had previously confronted Baldoni about inappropriate comments, suggesting "Reynolds believed that Baldoni had inappropriately commented on Lively's body and then engaged in inappropriate or 'predatory' actions towards Lively during filming."

The court emphasized: "No actual malice exists when a defendant seeks to harm a plaintiff by spreading facts the defendant genuinely (and not recklessly) believes are true."

Other Statements by Sloane

The Claim: Statements that "the whole cast hates" Baldoni.

These were protected opinions, not factual statements. The court found these comments were "rhetorical hyperbole" that "cannot reasonably [be] interpreted as stating actual facts." The judge noted there are "many reasons a person may be disliked or even hated" and such general statements "contain too many... elastic terms and elements of subjectivity to be susceptible of proof or disproof."

Claims Against The New York Times

Sexual Harassment Allegations

The Claim: That the Times falsely reported sexual misconduct occurred.

The court found the Times was simply reporting on Lively's legal complaint, not stating misconduct actually happened. The article was "clearly marked as the complaints in Lively's legal filing and are privileged as a fair and true report of that filing."

"Smear Campaign" Allegations

The Claim: That the Times falsely reported the defendants orchestrated a coordinated attack on Lively's reputation.

No actual malice was shown, and the court found the Times had substantial evidence supporting a smear campaign narrative.

The court detailed extensive text message evidence showing defendants:

• Stating Baldoni "wants to feel like she can be buried"

• Creating "Scenario Planning" documents with negative messaging about Lively

• Texting about putting a "social combat plan into motion"

• Discussing "flipping the narrative" and "shining a spotlight on Blake and Ryan"

The judge concluded: "The text messages are consistent with this view" of a smear campaign, and "The Times may have otherwise parroted the breathless 'smear campaign' narrative of Lively's complaint, but it had evidence to support that narrative."

The Bottom Line

The defamation claims failed because:

1. Privileged communications: Legal documents shared with press are protected

2. Lack of actual malice: Defendants genuinely believed their statements were true based on available information

3. Opinion vs. fact: Many statements were protected opinions rather than falsifiable facts

4. Strong supporting evidence: The Times had substantial documentary evidence supporting its reporting

As the court noted: "The great principles of the Constitution which secure freedom of expression in this area preclude attaching adverse consequences to any except the knowing or reckless falsehood." The First Amendment provides robust protection for press reporting and statements made in good faith, even when those statements prove harmful to public figures.

This claim was dismissed with prejudice against all parties.

Part Two Coming later (June 10).

Alright, I need to get my kids up and on the bus, so the rest of this analysis will have to come later today. If anyone has suggestions for how to make this more accessible (audio, video, whatever) let me know. This is a lot to write out and I'm wondering if there are better ways to get legal analysis like this to people who want to understand what's actually happening in these cases.

Understanding Non-Party Discovery in Federal Litigation: The Marvel-Wayfarer Mess You Didn’t Know You Needed

If you’ve ever watched a legal drama where some poor bystander gets dragged into court with a subpoena, congratulations!

You’ve met non-party discovery.

If you have ever received a subpoena for something you had no part in, congratulations!

You’ve also met non-party discovery!

And if you want a real-life, headline-grabbing example?

Look no further than the Marvel-Wayfarer dispute, where the MCU found itself yanked into a Hollywood legal showdown it did not ask for.

This piece is here to break it down, BUT not as legal advice (don’t @ me, internet), but as a peek behind the curtain at how federal courts juggle fairness, privacy, and the occasional celebrity feud.

SO - What Even Is Non-Party Discovery?

Non-party discovery happens when someone in a lawsuit says, “Hey, we need info from that person over there who’s not a part of this fight.”

Think of it as the legal version of roping your neighbor into your family drama.

The (basic) rulebook here is Federal Rule of Civil Procedure 45, which says:

• You can subpoena a non-party for documents, testimony, or access.

• But you have to avoid “undue burden or expense.”

Translation: Yes, you can knock on Marvel’s door, but no, you can’t set the house on fire or slam the door down to get inside.

So - Marvel Gets Pulled Into the Blake Lively-Justin Baldoni Chaos

The underlying lawsuit?

Blake Lively and Justin Baldoni, co-stars in It Ends With Us, are now on opposite legal teams. The Wayfarer Parties (including Baldoni) claim that Blake’s husband, Ryan Reynolds, defamed Baldoni by creating a “Nicepool” character (a Deadpool parody) that allegedly mocked Justin Baldoni.

So, naturally, Wayfarer subpoenaed… Marvel.

They asked for:

• Documents and communications on how Nicepool was developed.

• Documents and Communications mentioning Baldoni.

Marvel, understandably, was like: “Bro, we don’t even go here.”

The Legal Moves

Marvel’s Motion to Quash (April 25, 2025)

Marvel asked the court to cancel the subpoena or, at minimum, shield its confidential materials, arguing:

• The documents aren’t relevant. Even if “Nicepool” mocks Baldoni, satire is protected opinion, not defamation.

• The subpoena is massively overbroad, sweeping in draft scripts, production notes, and internal communications.

• This kind of sensitive creative material is critical to protect, since leaks could damage Marvel’s billion-dollar franchise.

• Even with a protective order, the risk of confidential info spilling in a high-profile, media-heavy case is too great.

• And if Wayfarer really wants this info, they should go ask Ryan Reynolds directly.

• As a fallback, Marvel asked the court to delay (stay) compliance with the subpoena until after Reynolds’ motion to dismiss is decided.

Wayfarer’s Opposition (April 28, 2025)

• Wayfarer clapped back to Marvel’s motion to quash, arguing:

  • Marvel failed to meaningfully meet and confer, arguing Marvel walked away from narrowing talks and ran to court.

  • The subpoena was already narrowed to focus only on Reynolds’ role in developing “Nicepool” and related communications about Baldoni.

  • Documents about “Nicepool” are relevant, especially to show Reynolds’ potential malice, even if the character is ultimately ruled opinion or satire.

  • California and New York law allow opinion-based defamation claims when the opinion relies on undisclosed facts, making discovery essential.

  • Marvel didn’t explain how responding to the narrowed subpoena would be unduly burdensome or costly.

  • Marvel’s argument that Wayfarer can just get the info from Reynolds or others is hollow — Marvel is also trying to block disclosure by any party.

  • The protective order already in place is more than enough to safeguard Marvel’s proprietary info.

  • The subpoena only concerns one film (Deadpool & Wolverine), and “Nicepool” won’t appear in future projects (because the character is already dead in the Marvel universe).

  • There’s no reason to delay compliance until Reynolds’ motion to dismiss is resolved, as Reynolds hasn’t sought to pause discovery, and the documents could still matter against Lively.

How the Rules Actually Work

Burden of proof:

In the Second Circuit (which is where the SDNY sits) the courts follow a well-established burden-shifting framework.

First, the party seeking discovery (here, Wayfarer) has to show the info they want is relevant and proportional to the needs of the case.

Once they clear that bar, the burden shifts to the non-party (Marvel) to prove compliance would be unduly burdensome, overbroad, or otherwise improper.

Spoiler: “We’re busy and don’t feel like it” is not a winning argument.

Grounds to quash or modify a subpoena:

Under Federal Rule of Civil Procedure 45, courts must quash or modify a subpoena if it:

• imposes an undue burden,

• requires disclosure of privileged or protected material without exception, or

• doesn’t allow reasonable time to comply.

Courts may quash or modify if the subpoena demands trade secrets, confidential info, or unretained expert opinions. So yes, if you’re trying to crack open Marvel’s vault, expect the judge to look very closely at whether it’s justified.

Balancing test:

Courts weigh several factors when deciding whether a subpoena crosses the line:

• relevance of the information,

• the requesting party’s need for the documents,

• the breadth and particularity of the request,

• the time period covered,

• the burden on the non-party, and

• whether the info can be obtained from a more convenient or less burdensome source (Ryan Reynolds).

In short, it’s a balancing act between getting useful evidence and not crushing outsiders under legal busywork.

Heightened protection for non-parties:

Non-parties, like Marvel, get special consideration because they didn’t sign up for this litigation circus. Courts expect parties to take reasonable steps to avoid imposing unnecessary burden or expense on non-parties, and they can impose sanctions if they don’t.

Confidentiality concerns:

Sensitive business info like draft scripts or unreleased creative materials doesn’t automatically kill a subpoena but it raises the stakes. Courts often solve this with a protective order (basically, “you can look, but no leaking to Variety or Twitter”), not a total shut-down.

Meet-and-confer requirement:

Before dragging the judge into it, lawyers are supposed to talk like adults and try to resolve the fight.

Wayfarer says Marvel bailed on those talks; Marvel says Wayfarer was vague and didn’t clarify what they really wanted. Classic discovery finger-pointing.

Judge’s discretion:

At the end of the day, the trial court calls the shots, weighing all the circumstances, including whether the subpoena is overly broad, cumulative, duplicative, or whether the info can be grabbed more easily somewhere else.

Relevance, Burden & Hollywood Drama

Wayfarer’s angle: The scope of relevance is broad, and even if “Nicepool” is technically opinion, how it was created could reveal Reynolds’ mindset.

Marvel’s angle: This is an enormous creative burden for something that may barely matter and we’re not handing over the MCU’s creative playbook.

Timing fight: Marvel wants to delay everything until the court rules on Reynolds’ motion to dismiss.

Wayfarer says: nice try, but Reynolds hasn’t frozen discovery, why should Marvel get to?

So What?

The Marvel-Wayfarer saga isn’t just Hollywood gossip. It’s a perfect case study in how our legal system juggles competing values:

• Truth-finding,

• Privacy,

• Fairness,

• Efficiency.

And yes, even the biggest names in entertainment can get subpoenaed like anyone else, but their non-party card buys them some extra armor.

What do you think the Judge will decide? Let me know in the comments. Expect a breakdown when we hear from the Judge.

Understanding Federal Discovery: The Basics

Before we get into the specific dispute between Sloane and the Wayfarer Parties, it’s important to understand what “federal discovery” actually means.

All of the rules are hyperlinked if you would like to look at the sources.

So WHAT Is Discovery?

Discovery is basically the phase in a lawsuit where both sides gather information from each other before trial.

Think of it like the legal version of fact-finding or information exchange, but with VERY specific rules.

In federal court, discovery is guided by a set of rules called the Federal Rules of Civil Procedure, specifically Rules 26 through 37. They are also governed by the specific Court, and specific Judge’s rules.

The big picture idea comes from Rule 26(b)(1), which says:

Parties can get discovery about any non-privileged matter that’s relevant to any party’s claim or defense — and it has to be proportional to the needs of the case.

In short: if the information is relevant and not protected by privilege (like attorney-client communications), it’s generally fair game.

But it has to stay reasonable and not turn into a fishing expedition.

The Main Discovery Tools

Federal discovery gives lawyers a toolbox, and here’s what’s inside:

1. Interrogatories (Rule 33)

• Written questions one party sends to the other.

• The receiving side has to answer in writing, under oath.

• You can only send these to people in the lawsuit, not outsiders.

• You’re limited to 25 questions, counting sub-questions (lawyers try to take advantage of the sub-parts sometimes).

• Answers are due within 30 days.

2. Requests for Production (Rule 34)

• A formal request for documents, emails, text messages, or even physical objects.

• Can also include asking to inspect a place or piece of property.

• Again, this is only between parties in the case (non-party subpoenas are different).

• They have 30 days to respond.

3. Depositions (Rule 30)

• This is when lawyers question a witness under oath, face-to-face, usually with a court reporter typing everything up.

• Depositions can be taken from both parties and non-parties (people or companies not named in the lawsuit).

• They typically last up to 7 hours per person.

• The side taking the deposition has to give “reasonable notice,” so it can’t be a last-minute ambush.

4. Requests for Admission (Rule 36)

• These are written requests asking the other side to admit or deny specific facts or legal points. These typically come AFTER most of discovery.

• If you ignore them or miss the 30-day deadline, the court can treat the facts as admitted.

• This tool helps narrow down what the parties actually disagree about before trial.

5. Physical and Mental Examinations (Rule 35)

• If a party’s physical or mental condition is important to the case, the court can order them to undergo an exam.

• This requires a formal court order and doesn’t come up in most routine lawsuits.

Mandatory Disclosures (Before the Tools Come Out)

Even before the parties start using these tools, they’re required to exchange some basic information under Rule 26(a), called Initial Disclosures. This helps legal teams figure out what tools to be used for what.

This includes:

• Names of people likely to have relevant information.

• Descriptions or copies of documents, emails, or other evidence they may use.

• Calculations of damages (how much they’re claiming they’re owed).

• Any insurance policies that might cover part of the claim.

Why Does This Matter?

Understanding these basics gives you the background you need to follow what’s happening in this dispute. When you hear about motions to compel, objections, or arguments over discovery, they all trace back to this structured process, where each side is trying to get the information they need to prove their case.

Now … the Competing Motions

First, let’s look at what Sloane’s team is arguing and why they say they need the court’s help to get information. Then, we’ll break down how the Wayfarer Parties (including Justin Baldoni) push back and explain why they believe Sloane is asking for too much, too soon.

The Foundation of this Motion?

Leslie Sloane's motion to compel is brought "pursuant to Individual Rule 4.C," which is a local rule for the Southern District of New York that establishes the procedure for requesting court intervention in discovery disputes.

The motion specifically targets five discovery requests:

Interrogatory Nos. 3, 4, 5, and 7.

Interrogatory No. 3

Asks the Wayfarer Parties to identify each person with whom Sloane allegedly communicated regarding them. This is fundamental in a defamation case - you need to know who supposedly heard the allegedly defamatory statements.

Interrogatories 4, 5, and 7

These seek to identify:

• Each defamatory statement Sloane allegedly made (No. 4)

• Each "malicious story portraying Baldoni as a sexual predator" (No. 5)

• Each "story critical of Baldoni, including that Baldoni was a sexual predator" (No. 7)

The motion notes that during meet-and-confer discussions, the Wayfarer Parties' counsel "could not even confirm whether the Wayfarer Parties are alleging that Ms. Sloane ever used the words 'sexual predator' or 'sexual assault.'"

Request for Production No. 32: The "Put Up or Shut Up" Demand

This request seeks documents the Wayfarer Parties "intend to rely on in drafting a further amended complaint." The motion reveals that the Wayfarer Parties have repeatedly claimed - both in court filings and to the press - that they have "obtained additional information about the Sloane Parties' activities."

The motion essentially calls their bluff, suggesting these claims might be empty threats designed to pressure Sloane.

Why is this information relevant?

They do a good job setting the stage: Sloane’s team is telling the court that they’ve been trying for months to get basic information from Wayfarer, but Wayfarer has dodged or given vague answers.

They’re accusing Wayfarer of:

• Not clearly saying what exactly Sloane supposedly said that was defamatory or put them in a “false light”

• Not explaining when, where, or how these things were supposedly said, and

• Not identifying who Sloane supposedly said these things to.

Basically: You’re accusing her of serious stuff, but you won’t tell us the details that’s not fair.

What’s the backstory?

Sloane’s lawyers point out that Wayfarer should have already spelled this out when they filed their lawsuit (that’s what complaints are supposed to do, explain why you’re suing). But instead, they say the Wayfarer side stayed very vague.

They say that even in their formal legal responses, Wayfarer only gave broad claims like:

We know and allege that Sloane called Baldoni a sexual predator and spread false stories to the Daily Mail.

But Sloane’s lawyers point out something really sharp here:

In an earlier lawsuit Wayfarer filed in California (against The New York Times), Wayfarer themselves included a screenshot from the Daily Mail reporter that seemingly admits that Sloane never said anything about sexual assault.

“I had many conversations with her about Blake and never once did she say anything about sexual assault. 1 had a three-way call with her and Melissa and she never said anything about it then either.”

That’s a huge contradiction — and Sloane’s team is using it to argue:

You can’t accuse us of something you’ve already submitted evidence doesn’t exist!

Why does this matter for Sloane?

Sloane flat-out denies ever calling Baldoni a sexual predator or accusing him of assault. But here’s the key point:

If she doesn’t know exactly what Wayfarer claims she said, or who she supposedly said it to, she can’t effectively defend herself.

In legal terms, this is about due process and fairness: you have the right to know what you’re being accused of so you can prepare a defense.

The Core Problem: Defamation Without Specifics

The motion highlights a fundamental legal paradox: the Wayfarer Parties have filed defamation and false light claims against Sloane but refuse to specify:

• What statements were allegedly made

• When or how these statements occurred

• To whom these statements were made

This creates an impossible situation for Sloane to mount a defense.

Imagine being charged with a crime but the prosecutor won't tell you what crime you allegedly committed. Or when? Or how?

The Procedural Chess Match: Local Civil Rule 33.3

Sloane’s team says the Wayfarer Parties are using Local Civil Rule 33.3 as a shield to avoid answering these interrogatories. This rule limits the types of questions that can be asked early in litigation to specific categories like:

• Names of witnesses with knowledge

• Computation of damages

• Existence and location of documents

• Information of a similar nature

However, Sloane's motion reveals two critical flaws in this defensive strategy:

1. Waiver Through Untimely Objection: The Wayfarer Parties didn't raise this Rule 33.3 objection in their initial written responses. Federal procedure operates on strict timelines, missing an objection in your initial response typically means you've waived the right to raise it later. The motion cites specific case law confirming this principle.

2. The Interrogatories Actually Comply with Rule 33.3: The motion argues that the requested information falls within Rule 33.3's permitted categories, particularly "names of witnesses with knowledge" and "information of a similar nature."

The Nuclear Option: Rule 11 Implications

The motion raises the idea that the Wayfarer Parties may lack a "Rule 11 basis" for their claims. Rule 11 requires attorneys to certify that claims have factual support and are not filed for improper purposes. By suggesting the Wayfarer Parties have no Rule 11 basis, Sloane's team is essentially accusing them of filing unsupported claims. This is serious.

Another big revelation? The Alleged Wiretapping Violation

In a footnote, the motion accuses Melissa Nathan of "surreptitiously listen[ing] to Ms. Sloane's phone calls in violation of California's wiretapping statute."

The evidence comes from the same Daily Mail reporter message, describing "a three-way call with her and Melissa" where Sloane apparently never knew Melissa was listening. Under California law, all parties must consent to having their calls recorded or monitored.

The Strategic Objectives of This Motion

This motion serves several strategic purposes:

1. Forcing Clarification: Attempts to compel the Wayfarer Parties to specify exactly what they're accusing Sloane of saying.

2. Creating a Paper Trail: Establishes on the court record the opposition's inability or unwillingness to provide basic information.

3. Setting Up Sanctions: If granted and the Wayfarer Parties still cannot provide specific allegations, it creates grounds for Rule 37 sanctions and potentially attorney's fees.

4. Testing the Strength of Claims: If no specific defamatory statements can be identified, it may lead to dismissal of these claims.

5. Exposing Potential Legal Violations: Brings attention to possible illegal wiretapping, which could have serious consequences for the other side.

The Legal Efficiency Argument

The motion emphasizes that interrogatories are "a more practical method of obtaining the information sought than a request for production or a deposition." This is particularly relevant given:

• The publicity surrounding this case

• The large number of articles written about it

• The need to target discovery requests efficiently

Without knowing which specific statements or articles are allegedly defamatory, Sloane would face the impossible task of reviewing every statement she's ever made and guess which ones are being challenged.

The Bottom Line

This motion to compel represents a pressure point in the case. If the Wayfarer Parties truly have specific allegations against Sloane, this motion forces them to articulate those claims clearly.

The motion's effectiveness lies in its simplicity: prove what you claim, or face the consequences of making unsupported allegations in federal court.

Switching Sides - What does Justin Baldoni’s team say?

Now that we understand Sloane’s side, let’s turn to how the Wayfarer Parties respond.

Wayfarer’s lawyers push back hard, arguing that Sloane already knows exactly what she’s accused of and that her motion isn’t really about getting fair discovery it’s about pressuring the court and trying to undermine their claims before the judge rules on dismissing the case.

Here’s how they lay out their side.

Sloane already knows what she’s accused of

Wayfarer says Sloane’s whole motion is based on a false idea, that she doesn’t know why she’s being sued.

They point to their Amended Complaint, where they say they already spelled out their claims:

• They say Sloane allegedly told reporters (including the New York Times) that Baldoni is a sexual predator who assaulted Lively.

• They claim Sloane said Baldoni retaliated against Lively for reporting misconduct.

• Sloane allegedly gave the Daily Mail dismissive statements like “You have it all wrong” but then secretly fed them negative stories about Baldoni, such as “the whole cast hates him.”

Wayfarer is arguing they’ve been clear enough and that Sloane has notice of the accusations, so she doesn’t need more details now.

Here’s more about the specific allegations

Wayfarer doubles down, pointing out that:

• Sloane allegedly told The New York Times that Wayfarer covered up or allowed sexual misconduct and retaliated against Lively.

• Sloane supposedly fed the press a “false and damning” story about Wayfarer orchestrating a PR smear campaign as revenge.

👉 Why it matters: Wayfarer is saying they already described not just the statements but also where they were made (to the press) and why they matter (to harm Wayfarer and Baldoni).

Interrogatory No. 3 is too broad

They say Sloane asked: “Tell us everyone we allegedly talked to about Wayfarer.”

Wayfarer pushes back, saying:

• That request is too broad it asks for anyone they talked to, not just people relevant to the case.

• Under court rules (Local Civil Rule 33.3), discovery questions need to focus on people with relevant knowledge, not just anyone.

They also point out that they’ve already provided an initial list of 150+ individuals and entities, and they argue that’s enough for now.

Wayfarer is saying Sloane is overreaching and fishing for information beyond what the rules allow (it sounds like Sloane did agree to limit this in their meet and confer).

We didn’t waive our objections.

Sloane argued that Wayfarer gave up its right to object by not following the proper procedure.

Wayfarer says:

• Nope, we raised objections properly and cited the rule.

• They say the cases Sloane relies on don’t apply because those were situations where the parties didn’t file objections correctly or missed deadlines.

Wayfarer is defending their procedural moves, saying they’re playing by the book.

Interrogatories 4, 5, 7 are improper

Sloane asked Wayfarer to identify:

• Each defamatory statement

• Each “malicious story” calling Baldoni a sexual predator

• Each critical story about Baldoni

Wayfarer says:

• These are contention interrogatories… basically, requests asking the other side to lay out all their arguments in detail, which usually aren’t allowed at this early stage.

• They argue the complaint already lays out the key allegations, so Sloane should know what they’re being accused of.

They also throw in a sharp point: If Sloane knows what she said, she shouldn’t need us to spell it out, she knows what’s defamatory.

Wayfarer is saying they’ve done their part, and Sloane can’t use discovery to force them to map out their entire case prematurely.

“Request for Production No. 32 is premature”

Sloane asked for:

• Any documents Wayfarer plans to use in drafting a second amended complaint (which hasn’t been filed yet).

Wayfarer’s response:

• That’s premature, you can’t ask for documents about something that doesn’t yet exist.

• Plus, anything related to drafting legal documents is likely protected by attorney-client privilege or work product rules.

They say if they ever file another complaint, they’ll produce relevant, non-privileged documents.

Wayfarer is protecting its legal strategy and saying Sloane is jumping the gun.

This is really about Sloane’s motion to dismiss

Wayfarer accuses Sloane of having a hidden agenda:

• They claim Sloane’s real goal is to re-argue her motion to dismiss the case and use discovery as a backdoor to pressure the court.

• Wayfarer points out that the judge already denied Sloane’s request to pause discovery, so they think this motion is just an attempt to sidestep that loss.

Wayfarer is framing Sloane’s motion as strategic posturing, not a genuine need for information.

Wayfarer’s overall message to the court:

We’ve already explained what we’re accusing Sloane of, she’s just trying to push us to lay out our full legal playbook early, which the rules don’t require. And by the way, this is really about her trying to weaken our case before the judge rules on dismissing it.

Likely Outcome: A Partial Win for Sloane — but not a full one.

*If Judge Liman does not send them back to meet and confer further on this.

Here’s why:

Sloane has a strong point on needing details

In defamation and false light cases, the plaintiff (Wayfarer/Justin Baldoni on these claims) is usually required to identify the specific statements they claim were defamatory, it’s not enough to say “you said bad things about us.” Courts generally require a clear roadmap of what’s being claimed so the defendant (Sloane) can prepare a defense.

Judges don’t like “hide-the-ball” tactics. On this point, Sloane’s demand for clearer details is reasonable and aligns with the principles of fair notice.

Wayfarer’s defense on “overbreadth” has some weight

Wayfarer is correct that Sloane’s Interrogatory No. 3 was initially very broad, asking for everyone Sloane ever communicated with about Wayfarer could sweep in irrelevant or privileged communications. It does sound like that has been limited in meet and confers, so this might be moot.

And their objection under Local Civil Rule 33.3 (which limits early interrogatories) is legitimate. Judges are often cautious about discovery overreach.

Wayfarer’s procedural arguments are a mixed bag

Wayfarer argues they properly objected and that Sloane is trying to prematurely map out their legal arguments. But here’s the problem: you can’t bring a defamation claim and then refuse to identify the allegedly defamatory statements. So even if some interrogatories were imperfectly drafted or framed as “contention interrogatories,” the court may still compel more precise responses.

The “Request for Production No. 32” probably fails for Sloane

Sloane’s attempt to force Wayfarer to hand over documents they might use in a future (not-yet-filed) amended complaint is premature. Wayfarer’s privilege and work product arguments are solid here, and the court will likely deny this part of Sloane’s motion.

I would predict:

• Sloane will likely win some limited relief, the judge may order Wayfarer to identify key defamatory statements and clarify basic allegations.

• Wayfarer will likely succeed in limiting the scope of Interrogatory No. 3 and avoiding premature production of documents tied to a possible amended complaint.

TLDR: This will probably end in a “split decision” where neither side gets everything they want. The court will push Wayfarer to be clearer but protect them from overly broad or premature demands.

This week in Blake Lively vs. Justin Baldoni, we got the predictable protective order, a legal strategy that’s playing out exactly as expected, and some truly wild arguments in Baldoni’s latest filing that are worth breaking down.

We’re talking:

✔️ The protective order and why both sides wanted it

✔️ The motion to dismiss standard and why Baldoni’s team is contradicting itself

✔️ Whether California or New York law applies and why that matters

✔️ Why Baldoni’s defamation claims are weak (and getting weaker)

✔️ The New York Times fight and how privilege protections work

And yes, I’m recording this because someone on Threads asked me to live react, which honestly seems healthier than trying to explain legal arguments on TikTok.

Substack Title:

The Blake Lively Lawsuit: Protective Orders, Legal Gymnastics, and the Art of Saying Everything While Arguing Nothing

Subtitle:

This week in Blake Lively vs. Justin Baldoni, we got the predictable protective order, a legal strategy that’s playing out exactly as expected, and some truly wild arguments in Baldoni’s latest filing that are worth breaking down.

We’re talking:

✔️ The protective order and why both sides wanted it

✔️ The motion to dismiss standard and why Baldoni’s team is contradicting itself

✔️ Whether California or New York law applies and why that matters

✔️ Why Baldoni’s defamation claims are weak (and getting weaker)

✔️ The New York Times fight and how privilege protections work

And yes, I’m recording this because someone on Threads asked me to live react, which honestly seems healthier than trying to explain legal arguments on TikTok, where people just yell at me.

The Battle for Confidentiality

At the center of this fight is a dispute over a "protective order"…

This is the legal mechanism that determines how sensitive information will be handled during the discovery phase. Both sides agree some protection is needed, but they're fighting over just how restrictive those protections should be.

Blake Lively's team wants an "Attorney's Eyes Only" (AEO) designation for certain materials, which would prevent even Justin Baldoni himself from seeing the most sensitive information. Only the attorneys would have access.

Justin Baldoni/Wayfarer Studios, on the other hand, argues this extra protection is unnecessary and hypocritical given how public Lively has already been with her allegations.

Round 1: Lively's Opening Salvo (Filed on February 20)

Lively's legal team made a compelling case for heightened protections by documenting:

• Online harassment including "pornographic trolling" so severe that Meta publicly condemned it

• Threats to witnesses, including one who received messages threatening sexual assault and murder of family members

• The need for extra protection in sexual harassment cases

• Specific vulnerabilities related to entertainment industry information

They backed these claims with legal precedent showing judges have granted similar protections in comparable cases.

Round 2: Wayfarer's Counter-Attack (Filed February 25)

Wayfarer's team responded with a strategy that essentially called out Lively for alleged hypocrisy:

• They highlighted how Lively had "actively publicized and litigated her claims in the media"

• Pointed to her 138-page, 500-paragraph complaint that already details the alleged harassment

• Referenced statements from Lively's representatives to the press

• Even mentioned Ryan Reynolds making a joke about the case on SNL's 50th Anniversary Special

• Argued the standard protective order provides sufficient protection

The subtext was clear: You can't claim privacy concerns when you've already gone public with so much.

Round 3: Lively's Rapid Counterpunch (Filed February 25)

In a FAST response filed the same day, Lively's team refocused the argument on three key points:

1. Third-party protection: They argued that witnesses and other third parties need special protection, especially given the documented threats.

2. Procedural failures: They claimed Wayfarer's position makes the standard conferral process pointless, since Wayfarer has already stated Lively "lacks a 'good faith' belief that there is any information" deserving protection.

3. Media manipulation: In perhaps their most explosive allegation, they suggested Wayfarer's team was coordinating with "online content creators" (noting at least one is a client of Wayfarer's counsel) to spread misleading narratives about the case.

They included a particularly pointed rebuke: "Leaving aside the callous disregard and disrespect for a woman advocating for the most basic workplace protections against sexual harassment..."

What's Really at Stake Here

This procedural battle reveals deeper tensions in how our legal system handles sexual harassment claims in the era of #MeToo:

• Can someone be both a public advocate against harassment while maintaining privacy in court?

• Does going public with allegations waive all privacy protections?

• Should alleged harassment victims have to share sensitive information directly with their alleged harassers?

• How do we balance witness protection against a defendant's right to review evidence?

The judge's decision on this seemingly technical issue will set the tone.

• Lively's team? Focuses on protection, safety, and the broader implications for harassment victims

• Wayfarer's team? Emphasizes inconsistency, publicity, and questions of motive

Both sides attempt to control what the dispute is "really about"…

What do you think?

What Happens Next

Judge Lewis J. Liman of the Southern District of New York will now have to decide whether to grant the standard protective order or the enhanced version with AEO provisions.

If you’ve spent any time on social media, you’ve probably seen creators talking about Justin Baldoni’s “receipts.” The 168-page timeline his legal team filed in court has been paraded around as proof that he’s in the right and Blake Lively is in the wrong. The problem? That document isn’t evidence. It’s a PR stunt, and the court is likely to strike it from the record.

What Is the Timeline, and Why Is It a Problem?

The so-called “timeline” is an exhibit Baldoni’s team attached to their complaint, supposedly laying out a clear sequence of events in his favor. But it’s not a neutral legal filing. It’s a curated, annotated, and redacted document filled with selective excerpts of emails and text messages, many of which are edited or missing context.

This isn’t how the legal system works. A real timeline of events would come out in discovery, where both sides get to present full, unedited evidence. Instead, Baldoni’s legal team attempted to shape public perception by filing a document designed to be shared online, not argued in court.

Leslie Sloan & Vision PR Are Pushing Back

Now, co-defendants Leslie Sloan and Vision PR have filed a motion to strike the timeline from the record. Their argument? This document violates federal court rules in multiple ways:

• Rule 8(a): Complaints must be short and plain, not bloated PR manifestos.

• Rule 10(c): Attachments must be actual legal documents, not curated narratives with red arrows and footnotes.

• Rule 12(f): Courts can remove filings that are irrelevant, immaterial, or scandalous.

The judge has already indicated that this timeline is exactly the kind of improper filing the federal rules are designed to prevent.

What Happens If the Court Grants the Motion to Strike?

If this motion is granted (and it likely will be) Baldoni’s timeline will be completely removed from the case. It won’t be considered in any legal ruling, and his team won’t be able to use it to argue their defense. More importantly, it undercuts their entire PR strategy.

For months, Baldoni’s supporters have pointed to this timeline as the ultimate proof of his innocence. But courts don’t operate on Twitter logic. Judges don’t care about social media narratives, they care about legal standards. And by filing this, Baldoni’s team played themselves.

The Takeaway

You can spin a case however you want on podcasts and TikTok, but in court, rules matter. If this document gets tossed, it’s a major (but assumably expected) blow to Baldoni’s legal team and their entire approach.

Courts aren’t here for PR theatrics, and this motion to strike proves it.

I went on a deep dive last night watching influencers spin wild takes on these subpoenas.

The biggest misconception?

That Blake Lively’s legal team is digging back to 2022 as some kind of desperate fishing expedition. The truth is, the timeline matters because this lawsuit isn’t just about her claims anymore.

It’s also about disproving Baldoni’s counterclaims.

December 2022 isn’t a random date, it’s likely when discussions about Lively’s role in It Ends With Us likely began. If Baldoni’s team is now claiming she took over the film, she has the right to pull receipts proving what was actually promised.

That’s how discovery works.

In my first ever audio file (lol, sorry for the background noise), I break down:

• Why the subpoena dates back to 2022

• What evidence might exist from this period

• Why deleted messages aren’t necessarily gone

• What Lively actually asked for from phone carriers (hint: it’s not text content)

This isn’t some legal overreach. It’s standard litigation.

Let’s unpack what’s really going on.

The media is running wild with the idea that Blake Lively’s legal team has launched some kind of scorched-earth subpoena attack on phone companies, demanding deeply private information and violating all sense of personal privacy.

But that’s not the real story.

This isn’t some over-the-top legal maneuver. It’s a completely normal step in litigation, and Baldoni’s team knows (or should know) it.

So let’s break this down:

• What these subpoenas actually ask for

• What they do NOT ask for

• Why Baldoni’s team is making noise about it

• Whether they can even do anything about it

And most importantly, what Blake Lively’s legal strategy really is.

First, What Even Is a Subpoena?

For anyone who doesn’t live in a courtroom drama, a subpoena is a legal request for documents, testimony, or other evidence.

There are two main types:

1. A party subpoena – Sent directly to a person or business involved in the case.

2. A non-party subpoena – Sent to someone not involved in the lawsuit but who has relevant information (like phone companies).

The ones making headlines right now?

Non-party subpoenas sent to major phone carriers like AT&T and Verizon.

Non-party subpoenas are SUPER common.

In a lawsuit, attorneys want as much factual evidence as possible, and people aren’t always great about handing things over voluntarily.

(Shocking, I know.)

But here’s the thing, a non-party subpoena isn’t a search warrant.

• The phone company can negotiate or object if they think it’s too broad.

• The person whose data is being requested (in this case, Baldoni) usually doesn’t get a say.

Unless they can argue privilege (like attorney-client communications), they don’t have standing.

Standing is the legal right to challenge something in court. You can’t just object to something because you don’t like it, you have to show that you’re directly affected in a way that the law recognizes.

Blake Lively’s team isn’t subpoenaing Baldoni directly. Instead, they sent subpoenas to third-party companies (like phone carriers) for call, text, and location records. That matters because:

• The subpoena isn’t directed at Baldoni, so he doesn’t automatically have standing to challenge it.

• The phone companies themselves can object if they think the request is too broad or legally improper.

• Baldoni’s lawyers can only intervene in limited situations, like if they argue the subpoenas violate privacy rights, are overly burdensome, or could reveal privileged information (e.g., lawyer-client communications). They could also argue the subpoena is being used for harassment rather than legitimate discovery.

Without a valid legal reason (like privilege or an extreme invasion of privacy Baldoni’s team doesn’t have the power to stop the phone companies from complying.

So why is Baldoni’s team making a fuss?

We’ll get there.

But what is Lively’s subpoena actually asking for?

The actual request asks for four main things:

1. Call logs – Records of incoming and outgoing calls (who called whom and when).

2. Text logs – Metadata about text messages (who texted whom and when).

3. Data logs – Records of mobile data usage (but not web browsing history).

4. Cell site location data – Information on which cell towers were used, which can estimate a person’s location at a given time.

Here’s what it doesn’t ask for that the whole internet seems to have wrong:

• The content of text messages (carriers don’t store these).

• Emails, social media messages, or anything from messaging apps like WhatsApp.

• Your Google search history or which websites were visited.

In short—this is a request for records, not private messages.

But why make the request at all if the phone companies don’t store texts?

Because these records still tell a story. If someone claims “We barely spoke,” but the logs show 100+ texts a day? That’s important.

And if messages were deleted, the logs can prove they existed.

This Is Just Step One in a Bigger Discovery Strategy

Baldoni’s team (and the press) are acting like these subpoenas are Lively’s only shot at getting phone records. That’s adorable.

This is one small step in what will likely be a broad discovery strategy, including:

• Demanding phone records directly from Baldoni and the other defendants.

• Requesting emails, screenshots, and internal messages from production companies.

• Depositions (where people have to answer questions under oath).

If texts exist, she’ll find them.

If messages were deleted, there will still be breadcrumbs leading back to them.

This isn’t a fishing expedition. It’s basic litigation 101.

So Why Is Baldoni’s Team Acting Like This Is a Big Deal?

If these subpoenas are so standard, why is Baldoni’s team trying to paint them as a massive overreach?

Three possibilities:

1. The logs might contradict their timeline. If they claimed they “barely talked,” but records show daily calls and texts? That’s a problem.

2. Deleted messages could come back to haunt them. If texts were erased, but the logs prove they were sent? That raises big questions.

3. The location data might be inconvenient. If someone said they were in one place, but the records say otherwise, that’s bad news.

And here’s the kicker—if this information were totally harmless, why fight so hard to keep it out of court?

Can Baldoni’s Team Even Stop This?

Short answer: Probably not.

Longer answer: They can yell about it all they want, but they don’t have much legal ground to stand on.

Because these subpoenas are going to phone companies, not Baldoni himself, he can’t just say, “I don’t like this, make it stop.”

The phone companies can:

• Comply (most common).

• Negotiate a narrower request (if they think it’s too broad).

• Object entirely (rare, unless the request is truly unreasonable).

Baldoni’s team? They don’t have standing to fight it unless they argue it violates privilege or is wildly overreaching.

So while they might make a big deal in public, legally? They don’t have much say.

What Happens Next?

• The phone companies will review the subpoenas and decide whether to comply, push back, or negotiate. Blake’s team will respond to Justin’s lawyers, explaining why they are wrong, and the Judge will likely yell at everyone for having to be involved with this alread.

• Lively’s legal team will keep pulling records, this is just the beginning. Justin’s will do the same.

• If the phone logs don’t match Baldoni’s public statements, this could get a lot messier.

But the real question no one is asking isn’t why Blake Lively subpoenaed phone records.

That’s normal.

The real question is: Why is Baldoni’s team making it seem like she asked for every text? Or is that just how the media is understanding it?

When people fight this hard in public over basic discovery, it’s usually because they really, really don’t want those records out there…

(That is not Blake Lively it is a stock photo).

Alright, here we go. If you have ever read a headline about a lawsuit and thought, wait, how does this actually work?

You’re in the right place.

This is my first breakdown in a series where we’ll be covering every legal filing in the Blake Lively/Justin Baldoni harassment case, explaining what each document means, why it exists, and how it fits into the broader legal system.

No clickbait, no legalese (annoying lawyer language) just a clear, detailed look at how cases like this actually move through the system.

And where better to start than the very first step: the California Civil Rights Department (CCRD) complaint.

This is the document that kicks off the legal process in workplace harassment and discrimination cases. It’s not a criminal charge (more on that in a second), but it’s a necessary step before filing certain lawsuits in California. We’ll explain:

• What the CCRD is and why it exists

• How these complaints work

• Why Blake Lively had to file one before suing

• What actually happened after she filed

What is the CCRD and Why Does It Exist?

The California Civil Rights Department (CCRD) is the state agency responsible for enforcing California’s civil rights laws, particularly those that protect people from discrimination, harassment, and retaliation in workplaces, housing, and public spaces.

Think of it as California’s version of the Federal EEOC (Equal Employment Opportunity Commission) but with more teeth when it comes to state law. If you’re an employee in California and you believe you’ve experienced workplace discrimination, sexual harassment, or retaliation, the CCRD is where your legal journey starts.

Why? Because under California law (the Fair Employment and Housing Act, or FEHA), BEFORE you can file a lawsuit against an employer for discrimination or harassment, you must first file a complaint with the CCRD. This process gives the agency a chance to investigate, attempt to resolve the issue, and (if necessary) issue a Right to Sue letter, which clears the way for a formal lawsuit.

So when Blake Lively filed her CCRD complaint on December 20, 2024, she wasn’t immediately suing. She was taking the required first step to pursue legal action. This is not unique to her. Every workplace harassment or discrimination case in California starts this way.

And yes, this step is completely normal. If you’ve got a lawyer (which Blake Lively did and does), they typically submit a fully drafted legal complaint along with the CCRD filing. That’s not some dramatic legal move; it’s literally what any attorney does to prepare for the next step.

So, What Did Blake Lively Submit to the CCRD?

When Blake Lively decided to take legal action, she didn’t just fire off an angry letter. She followed the process, submitting three key documents to the California Civil Rights Department (CCRD). Each serves a distinct purpose, and together, they set the stage for the case. Let’s break them down.

1. The CCRD Complaint (Filed December 20, 2024)

This is the official Complaint of Employment Discrimination, filed under California’s Fair Employment and Housing Act (FEHA). It outlines the allegations against Wayfarer Studios LLC, Justin Baldoni, and several others. This is not the 84 page complaint in the New York Times. It is a much shorter document.

What’s in it?

This document outlines the core legal claims and establishes the basis for Lively’s allegations against the respondents.

Claims Alleged

• Sexual harassment – Hostile work environment

• Retaliation for reporting or resisting harassment

• Failure to investigate, prevent, and/or remedy harassment

• Aiding and abetting harassment and retaliation

These are all violations of California’s FEHA and Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964 (which governs workplace discrimination and harassment at the federal level).

Who is Named? (The Respondents)

Lively’s complaint names multiple individuals and entities as respondents:

Primary Employer:

• Wayfarer Studios LLC – The production company behind the project in question, which is accused of failing to prevent and respond to the alleged misconduct.

Named Individuals:

• Justin Baldoni – Actor, director, and co-founder of Wayfarer Studios.

• Jamey Heath – Wayfarer executive.

• Steve Sarowitz – Executive associated with Wayfarer Studios.

• Melissa Nathan – Individual associated with the company (role not yet fully disclosed).

Public Relations & Communications Firms Involved:

• The Agency Group PR LLC

• Jennifer Abel (Individual associated with The Agency Group PR)

• RWA Communications LLC

• Jed Wallace (Individual associated with RWA Communications)

• Street Relations Inc.

Why Name So Many People?

Workplace harassment claims don’t always just go after the employer, they can also target individuals who engaged in or facilitated the alleged misconduct. This is common in cases where someone is accusing a company culture of enabling harassment and retaliation.

2. The Right to Sue Letter (Issued December 20, 2024)

Once a complaint is filed, a person can either wait for the CCRD to investigate (which can take months) or request an immediate Right to Sue notice, which allows them to take the case straight to court. Lively and her lawyers chose the latter.

What’s in it?

• A formal notice that the CCRD is closing the case because Lively is moving forward with a lawsuit

• A one-year deadline to file her lawsuit

• A reminder that for federal claims under Title VII, she needs to separately request a Right to Sue from the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (EEOC)

Why Skip the Investigation?

Because Lively has legal representation. Lawyers almost always request an immediate Right to Sue because they want control over the case rather than waiting on a government agency’s timeline.

3. The 81-Page Draft Complaint (Attached to the CCRD Filing)

Unlike the CCRD complaint, which is procedural and brief, this 81-page document is a detailed legal argument that previews what would later be filed in court. If you are following this story at all, you obviously read this initial complaint.

What’s in it?

• Detailed allegations of misconduct, harassment, and retaliation.

• Specific incidents that Lively’s legal team claims support her case.

• Legal arguments explaining how these actions violated state and federal employment laws.

• A roadmap for litigation, since this document is typically what gets officially filed in court after the Right to Sue is granted.

Is an 81-Page Complaint Unusual?

No. This is standard practice for lawyers preparing a serious case. If you have an attorney, they’re not just submitting a form—they’re laying out every legal argument and factual allegation upfront.

If we were representing a client in a New York State Division of Human Rights (NYSDHR) or EEOC complaint, we would do the same thing. This is how employment discrimination cases are built.

Why This Matters

These three documents tell us a lot about the case. They show that Lively was properly and formally beginning a legal process.

• The CCRD complaint is the required first step.

• The Right to Sue letter is the next move for taking it to court.

• The 81-page complaint signals that her legal team wasn’t messing around, they were ready to litigate from the start.

Whether you think this is about headlines or social media speculation, Blake Lively’s team followed the process for pursuing workplace harassment and discrimination claims in California. They followed it by the book.

We need to catch up with the different filings so we will be posting multiple times per day. Please following along on socials if you would like more content.

(If you want copies of these documents, they are publicly available through Pacer, or feel free to send me a DM on instagram).