Could Taylor Swift be deposed in the Blake Lively, Justin Baldoni legal battle?
Baldoni's legal team is seeking to depose Taylor Swift in the legal battle between Blake Lively and Justin Baldoni.
According to a letter submitted by Baldoni's legal team led by Bryan Freedman on Sept. 11 to Lewis J. Liman, the U.S. District Judge overseeing the case, his team said that Swift "agreed to appear for deposition, which will be taken sometime between Oct. 20 and 25 due to "preexisting professional obligations," according to the letter filed by Freedman's firm.
The singer previously announced in August that she will be releasing her 12th studio album, "The Life of a Showgirl," on Oct. 3.
While Baldoni's team says that Swift agreed to appear for a deposition in that time frame, Douglas Baldridge, an attorney for Swift clarified in a letter that Swift "did not agree to a deposition."
"As counsel for the parties know, since the inception of this matter we have consistently maintained that my client has no material role in this action," Baldridge said in a letter obtained by ABC News. "Further, my client did not agree to a deposition, but if she is forced into a deposition, we advised (after first hearing about the deposition just three days ago) that her schedule would accommodate the time required during the week of October 20 if the parties were able to work out their disputes. We take no role in those disputes."
Baldoni's letter was also met with criticism by Lively's counsel in part because the deposition would fall after the discovery cut-off date, which is slated for the end of September.
In their letter filed on Friday by Lively's counsel, Michael J. Gottlieb, they accused Baldoni of requesting an "extension of the discovery schedule for the sole purpose of taking the deposition of third-party Taylor Swift."
Lively's counsel also called Baldoni's tactic of bringing Swift into the legal battle once again a "relentless media strategy" and added that Baldoni's "request should be denied."
Baldoni's representative declined to comment to ABC News.
ABC News has reached out to a representative for Lively.
Lively and Baldoni, who both starred in the 2024 film "It Ends With Us," have been embroiled in a legal battle since December 2024, when Lively filed a complaint against Baldoni with the California Civil Rights Department, accusing him of sexual harassment on the set of the film, which Baldoni also directed.
Lively and Baldoni subsequently launched dueling lawsuits against each other, with Lively alleging that Baldoni and key stakeholders of the film sexually harassed her and attempted, along with Baldoni's production company and crisis PR company, The Agency Group PR, to orchestrate a smear campaign against her.
Baldoni denied the allegations via a statement from his attorney, who called Lively's actions "shameful" for making "serious and categorically false accusations" against Baldoni.
Baldoni later sued Lively, her husband Ryan Reynolds, the couple's publicist Leslie Sloane, and Sloane's public relations company, Vision PR, for extortion and defamation, among other things.
Lively's lawyers called Baldoni's lawsuit "another chapter in the abuser playbook" and accused Baldoni of "trying to shift the narrative to Ms. Lively by falsely claiming that she seized creative control and alienated the cast from Mr. Baldoni."
Read more about their legal battle here.
In May, Swift was subpoenaed as a witness by Baldoni's lawyer, Bryan Freedman.
Freedman told Harvey Levin and Mark Geragos of TMZ's "2 Angry Men" podcast at the time that he wasn't ruling out deposing Swift, who has been a longtime friend of Lively.
"Anyone that reasonably has information that can provide evidence in this case is gonna be deposed," Freedman said.
In response, a spokesperson for the singer at the time said she wasn't involved in the film except to license her song, "My Tears Ricochet," and was never on set.
The spokesperson added that Swift's subpoena was "designed to use Taylor Swift's name to draw public interest by creating tabloid clickbait instead of focusing on the facts of the case."
Lawyers for Lively and Reynolds tried to block the subpoena, and Baldoni's legal team also claimed in a court filing days later that Lively's attorney "demanded that Ms. Swift release a statement of support for Ms. Lively," alleging that "if Ms. Swift refused to do so, private text messages of a personal nature in Ms. Lively's possession would be released."
Gottlieb said in a statement to ABC News in May that the allegations made in Baldoni's court filing about Lively allegedly pressuring Swift are "categorically false."
By the end of May, sources with direct knowledge told ABC News at the time that Swift was no longer facing a subpoena from Baldoni.
Sources with direct knowledge said that the subpoena was no longer needed because the necessary information had been obtained.
Lively and Baldoni are due to appear in the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of New York on March 9, 2026, with Judge Lewis Liman overseeing the case.
