Blake Lively’s legal team has filed a motion requesting sanctions against Bryan Freedman, lead attorney for actor and director Justin Baldoni, alleging that he launched a coordinated media campaign aimed at tarnishing Lively’s reputation ahead of their upcoming trial.
According to the motion, Freedman is accused of violating a court order that limits pre-trial publicity by giving interviews to several high-profile media outlets, including TMZ, People, Billy Bush, and Megyn Kelly. Lively’s lawyers claim these appearances featured “biased and inflammatory pre-trial indictments of Ms. Lively’s character, credibility, and reputation.”
In one notable interview with TMZ, Freedman implied that Lively was “afraid of the truth” and might not appear for her deposition—a suggestion proven false when Lively sat for the legal proceeding on August 31. Just a day later, Baldoni’s legal team filed a motion regarding a discovery dispute and, in a controversial move, attached a sealed 292-page transcript of Lively’s deposition as an exhibit.
Blake Lively’s lawyers argue this action was designed to further influence public opinion and pressure the court. “The Wayfarer Defendants and their counsel hope to make Ms. Lively defend the continued sealing of the transcript so they can advance a false narrative that Ms. Lively is afraid of her deposition testimony becoming public, which is entirely untrue and deeply harmful,” Lively’s team wrote in their filing.
The dispute stems from an ongoing legal battle involving Lively and the production company Wayfarer Studios, co-founded by Justin Baldoni. Details of the lawsuit remain largely confidential due to existing court-imposed privacy measures, but the increasingly public nature of the case has raised concerns about media influence on judicial proceedings.
Lively’s legal team argues that Freedman’s public comments not only violate the spirit of the gag order but also risk compromising the fairness of the trial itself. By preemptively framing Lively’s actions and intentions in a negative light, they claim Freedman is attempting to try the case in the court of public opinion rather than before a judge and jury.
So far, Freedman has not issued a public response to the motion for sanctions. As the legal standoff escalates, both sides appear entrenched, with Lively’s team now pushing back firmly against what they describe as deliberate media manipulation. The court has yet to rule on the motion, but legal observers suggest that the judge may need to issue further guidance on pre-trial publicity to ensure the case proceeds without additional interference.