Blake Lively is fighting Justin Baldoni’s continued attempts to see her texts with Taylor Swift in the It Ends With Us litigation, saying the movie’s director and co-star shouldn’t be allowed to drag Swift into the court battle just to generate “sensational headlines.”
Lively filed a motion on Friday (June 13) asking a federal judge to shut down Baldoni’s discovery request seeking all communications between the actress and Swift, her longtime close friend, related to It Ends With Us or Lively’s lawsuit alleging Baldoni sexually harassed her on the film’s set and then orchestrated a smear campaign in retaliation for her complaints.
Baldoni and his production company, Wayfarer Studios, previously sought these communications via subpoenas to Swift and her lawyers. But the pop superstar’s reps vehemently opposed the subpoenas as “tabloid clickbait,” and Baldoni withdrew the requests last month.
According to the Friday filing, Lively’s team is unsure whether Swift handed over any texts as part of a deal with Baldoni to get the subpoenas dropped. Though Swift’s attorney advised them that “no documents are being produced,” the same day, a Daily Mail article quoted an “insider” stating that the Wayfarer team got “exactly what they were seeking” from the pop star.
Lawyers for Lively say this “insider” quote, published by a Daily Mail reporter with known ties to Baldoni’s publicists, could be interpreted either to mean that Swift produced documents or that the hefty tabloid coverage of Swift’s subpoena was enough to achieve Baldoni’s aims.
“Either interpretation of the reason the Wayfarer parties withdrew the subpoenas warrants the entry of a protective order,” write Lively’s attorneys. “If the Wayfarer parties received documents from Ms. Swift such that they have ‘exactly what they’ need, then the discovery sought … is cumulative and duplicative, and need not be produced again by Ms. Lively.”
“If, on the other hand,” Lively’s lawyers continue, “the Wayfarer parties were ‘seeking’ only sensational headlines by serving the subpoenas rather than materials to support their claims and defenses, they are not entitled to the information… The purpose of civil discovery is to obtain information relevant to claims and defenses in court, not to prop up a public relations narrative outside of court.”
Some of the ”sensational headlines” generated by the Swift subpoena revolved around allegations from Baldoni’s lawyers that Lively had asked Swift to delete text messages and tried to extort her into voicing public support for the sexual harassment lawsuit. These claims, attributed to an anonymous source and denounced by Lively’s team as “categorically false,” were struck from the case’s docket after Judge Lewis J. Liman determined they were improper, irrelevant and “potentially libelous.”
Judge Liman dealt another loss to Baldoni earlier this week when he threw out the actor-director’s defamation countersuit, which alleged that Lively conspired with the New York Times, her husband Ryan Reynolds and publicist Leslie Sloane to fabricate the sexual harassment and retaliation claims.
A rep for Lively cited this dismissal ruling in a statement to Billboard regarding Baldoni’s continued pursuit of the actress’ communications with Swift.
“The ongoing attempts to once again try and use the world’s biggest star as a PR tactic in this matter reflects a public unraveling of epic proportions — and serves only to distract from the fact that Justin Baldoni’s lawsuits against Ms. Lively, Ryan Reynolds, their publicist and the New York Times have been entirely dismissed,” said a Lively spokesperson on Friday (June 13).
Reps for Baldoni and Swift did not return requests for comment.
The continued fight over the Swift text messages comes as Lively is serving her own subpoena on the singer’s public opponent, Scooter Braun. Lively wants to know what Braun knows about the alleged smear campaign orchestrated by publicity firm The Agency Group PR, a controlling stake of which is reportedly owned by Braun’s company, HYBE America.
