Blake Lively Claims Justin Baldoni Is ‘Afraid to Produce’ Phone Records; His Lawyer Says She and Ryan Reynolds ‘Are Not the FBI’
Justin Baldoni’s legal team is fighting the subpoenas Blake Lively and Ryan Reynolds submitted earlier this week to “expose” the alleged smear campaign the couple claims the It Ends with Us director launched against Lively.
In a new letter to U.S. District Judge Lewis J. Liman filed on Friday, Feb. 14, Baldoni’s lawyer Mitchell Schuster called the subpoenas — through which Lively, 37, and Reynolds, 48, requested access to years of phone and text records, location data and other information — “flagrantly overbroad.”
“It is hard to overstate how broad, invasive, and atypical these Subpoenas truly are,” Schuster says in the memo. “This is civil litigation, not a criminal prosecution, and the Lively Parties [Lively and Reynolds] are not the FBI.”
Related: Blake Lively and Justin Baldoni Reject Mediation, Say Settlement Talks Would Be ‘Premature’
The legal dispute between the It Ends with Us costars began in December 2024, when Lively filed a sexual harassment complaint against Baldoni, 41, accusing him of misconduct during the film’s production. She also alleged that Baldoni and his associates engaged in a retaliatory smear campaign designed to “destroy” her reputation when she spoke up. Baldoni has denied all claims against him.
In January, Baldoni responded with a $400 million lawsuit against Lively, Reynolds, their publicist Leslie Sloane and Sloan’s PR firm alleging several claims, including civil extortion and defamation. The case, Lively v. Wayfarer Studios et al., is scheduled to go to trial on March 9, 2026.
The records Lively and Reynolds are now seeking with the subpoenas (which they submitted to AT&T, Verizon and T-Mobile earlier this week) could reveal not just “the complete call and text history of each of the targets,” Baldoni included, but also location data, web browser history and legally protected information, Schuster claims in the newly filed memo.
Along with the Jane the Virgin actor’s records, the phone company subpoenas request records pertaining to other defendants in Lively’s suit, including publicists Melissa Nathan and Jennifer Abel, and Wayfarer Studios CEO Jamey Heath and co-founder Steve Sarowitz.
Related: Blake Lively’s Lawyers Take Dig at Justin Baldoni’s Website, Say Receipts are ‘Nowhere to Be Found’ on It
The requested records, Schuster argues in the letter, are “wildly disproportionate to the needs of the case and unnecessarily invades the privacy of untold numbers of third parties, including family, friends, business partners, and — quite literally — any other person with whom any of the targets have communicated with over a period of years.”
The lawyer also claims that the subpoenas are more about media attention than the case itself, dubbing them a “media ploy” because they were “leaked alongside a lengthy and combative statement” from Lively’s lawyers. (The actress filed subpoenas to “expose the people, tactics, and methods that have worked to ‘destroy’ and ‘bury’ her reputation and family over the past year,” her lawyers, Mike Gottlieb and Esra Hudson, said in a statement to PEOPLE on Wednesday, Feb. 12.)
Baldoni’s legal team claim they attempted to raise their issues with the subpoenas and resolve the dispute with Lively’s team to no avail. Schuster is requesting that Judge Liman address the issue “at the soonest possible opportunity,” and suggests that the phone companies involved are preparing to comply.
Related: It Ends with Us Author Colleen Hoover Returns to Instagram — and Removes Photos of Justin Baldoni and Blake Lively
In response to the memo from Baldoni’s legal team, a spokesperson for Lively referenced Baldoni lawyer Bryan Freedman’s previous claim of having “receipts” that would allegedly prove Lively was a “bully.” The spokesperson tells PEOPLE, “If they have so many receipts why are they so afraid to produce them.”
“Mr. Baldoni and the Wayfarer parties have already admitted that Ms. Lively raised concerns multiple times. They have admitted that they created a plan in case she ‘made her grievances public,’ in which they planned to plant stories suggesting Ms. Lively was a ‘bully’ and ‘weaponizing feminism.’ They have admitted that they were able to ‘bury’ anyone,” the spokesperson says, referring to alleged texts exchanged by Baldoni and his PR team obtained through earlier subpoenas.
“They have admitted that they bragged and laughed at how negatively the narrative had shifted against Ms. Lively, and how successful they were at ‘confusing’ people,” the spokesperson continues. “They have admitted that they said they ‘started to see a shift on social, due largely to [Jed Wallace, an independent contractor] and his team’s efforts to shift the narrative,’ yet they deny that they implemented their plan.”
“Now they want to block the very discovery that would expose them,” concludes Lively’s spokesperson. “If they didn’t do it, they would have nothing to hide.”
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Shortly after Lively and Reynolds filed the new phone company subpoenas, Baldoni’s lawyer Freedman responded to the move in a Feb. 12 statement, saying, “Subpoenas are an ordinary part of the litigation process. What is extraordinary is what the Lively Parties are seeking. They are asking for every single call, text, data log and even real-time location information for the past 2.5 years, regardless of the sender, recipient or subject matter.”
“This massive fishing expedition demonstrates that they are desperately seeking any factual basis for their provably false claims,” Freedman added. “They will find none.”