Lawyers in Lively-Baldoni feud spar over subpoenas of Candace Owens, Megyn Kelly

MANHATTAN (CN) — Content creators are finding their way into the bitter legal clash between Hollywood A-listers Blake Lively and Justin Baldoni, as a Wednesday hearing on Lively’s subpoenas drew mentions of Candace Owens, Megyn Kelly and Perez Hilton.

Lively wants to subpoena Liner Freedman Taitelman Cooley, the law firm of Baldoni’s attorney Bryan Freedman. She suspects that Freedman is part of Baldoni’s supposed ongoing “smear campaign” against her, and that Freedman is using his deep Rolodex of influencer clients to circulate the campaign online.

“We certainly did not pay any content creators,” Liner Freedman attorney Ellyn Garofalo said at Wednesday’s hearing.

Garofalo argued Lively’s subpoenas, which seek information about agreements between content creators and Freedman, are overly burdensome to the firm, risk breaching privilege and should be quashed.

Garofalo also claimed that no such agreements exist, prompting the judge to question why he needed to rule on this issue in the first place.

“Why are you asking me to write an opinion saying you don’t have to answer the question that you’ve answered … here today in front of this assembled crowd?” asked U.S. District Judge Lewis Liman, a Donald Trump appointee.

In addition to Freedman, Lively’s team also subpoenaed right-wing influencers Candace Owens and Megyn Kelly, as well as gossip blogger Perez Hilton — all of whom purportedly have working relationships with Freedman and produced content criticizing Lively over the feud with Baldoni.

Lively’s attorney Michael Gottlieb of Willkie Farr & Gallagher pointed to past comments from Freedman, quoting him as saying Lively has a “reputation for being a bitch” and “is a narcissist who cannot accept how she has behaved.”

“These are the things Mr. Freedman says when he goes on his client’s shows,” Gottlieb said, arguing in support of the subpoenas.

Gottlieb added that it is a “misrepresentation” to suggest that no agreements were made between Freedman and his content creator clients. He argued that, by his count, Hilton posted more than 500 times about the spat between Lively and Baldoni on his gossip website, with the posts skewing in Baldoni’s favor.

“We’d like to know about Perez Hilton,” Gottlieb said. “We’d like to know if there is actually an agreement in place between the two of them.”

Owens, Gottlieb claimed, had shared an “exclusive scoop” about Lively and Baldoni that used information from Freedman’s affidavit.

Gottlieb also argued that he was recently made aware of a text chain in which Freedman introduced Baldoni’s team to another content creator client of his, who then went on to disseminate content attacking Lively.

“I am unable to say the name of this person in open court,” Gottlieb said.

Liman didn’t immediately rule on whether he’d quash the subpoenas, though he did say that he found one — which seeks Freedman’s communications with various media sources — “tremendously broad” and “actually quite chilling.”

Still, the judge’s ruling is unlikely to end this saga. With both sides apparently disagreeing on whether agreements were made between content creators and Freedman’s law firm, Gottlieb acknowledged he may move to compel discovery in the not-so-distant future.

Liman previously quashed subpoenas from Lively seeking Baldoni’s phone records, finding them “overly intrusive.”

Wednesday’s hearing was part of a countersuit by Freedman’s law firm to quash these new subpoenas. But it’s just one of several actions in the sprawling web of Lively and Baldoni’s legal dispute.

It all started in December 2024, when Lively came forward with accusations of sexual harassment against Baldoni when they co-starred in the romantic drama film “It Ends With Us.”

Lively shared those misconduct claims with The New York Times, kicking off a flurry of legal action between the duo. Lively’s publicist claimed Baldoni orchestrated a public smear campaign to damage her credibility in the wake of the harassment claims. The following week, Lively sued Baldoni directly for harassment.

Baldoni then hit Lively with a $400 million defamation and extortion countersuit, claiming Lively and her husband actor Ryan Reynolds tried to “destroy” him and “hijack” the premiere of “It Ends With Us.” Liman dismissed that lawsuit in June, but Baldoni will be allowed to revise and refile some of the claims.

Follow @Uebey Follow @uebey.bsky.social