Blake Lively’s lawyers accused Justin Baldoni‘s legal team of resorting to “blame the victim” tactics to distract from the sexual harassment allegations she’s leveled against her It Ends With Us co-star.
In the statement obtained by Rolling Stone, Lively’s lawyers said her “serious claims of sexual harassment and retaliation” are “backed by concrete facts.” They rejected any categorization of the legal spat as “a ‘feud’ arising from ‘creative differences’ or a ‘he said/she said’ situation.’”
Instead, they insisted they would prove that Baldoni, his production company, Wayfarer Studios, and others “engaged in unlawful, retaliatory astroturfing against Ms. Lively for simply trying to protect herself and others on a film set.”
Lively’s lawyers went on to criticize the response to Lively’s suit, saying they’ve hinged on launching “more attacks” against the actress. “A classic tactic to distract from allegations of this type of misconduct is to ‘blame the victim’ by suggesting that they invited the conduct, brought it on themselves, misunderstood the intentions, or even lied,” the statement said. “Another classic tactic is to reverse the victim and offender, and suggest that the offender is actually the victim. These concepts normalize and trivialize allegations of serious misconduct.”
Lively first took legal action against Baldoni late last year, accusing him of sexually harassing her on set and orchestrating a smear campaign against her. Baldoni’s lawyer, Bryan Freedman, denied the allegations at the time, claiming Lively’s suit was an attempt to “fix her negative reputation.” (Lively has since filed a second, similar complaint in the Southern District of New York.)
Baldoni and some of the other plaintiffs — including publicists Melissa Nathan and Jennifer Abel — have already filed a lawsuit of their own, though that one was a libel complaint against The New York Times over its story about Lively’s harassment and smear campaign allegations.
Freedman, in a recent interview with NBC News, says Baldoni “absolutely” plans to bring a lawsuit against Lively, too. “We’re working on it now,” he said the time, calling Lively’s smear campaign accusations “100 percent” false.
Freedman also appeared on NewsNation with Chris Cuomo Monday night, where he spoke about the lawsuit against The Times. “We’re going to take what the young kids call receipts, and we’re going to take those text messages and we’re going to put them out for the public to see,” Freedman said. “And we’re doing it as we speak, and we have been doing it, and what you’re starting to see is you’re starting to see a complete turnaround in this story, and you’re starting to see a turnaround because people are questioning, is this truthful or not?”
In their statement, issued not long after, Lively’s lawyers appeared to allude to Freedman’s recent TV appearances, saying, “Most importantly, media statements are not a defense to Ms. Lively’s legal claims. We will continue to prosecute her claims in federal court, where the rule of law determines who prevails, not hyperbole and threats.” (Freedman did not immediately return a request for additional comment.)
