Blake Lively and Justin Baldoni’s legal battle is taking a turn for the worse, as it now involves not only Taylor Swift but also the pop star’s father, Scott Swift.
In a surprising twist, Scott has been revealed as the insider who leaked Blake’s alleged threat against his daughter if Taylor didn’t publicly support Blake in the legal dispute with her It Ends With Us co-star.
As one of the most celebrated friendships in Hollywood is now being tainted by a high-profile lawsuit, let’s take a look at Scott’s involvement in the case.
Why is Scott Swift Suddenly Involved in Blake Lively–Justin Baldoni Legal Drama?
Scott is willing to do everything to defend Taylor amid the ongoing, not to mention worsening, Blake-Justin legal drama after a subpoena has been dropped against Travis Kelce’s girlfriend.
According to the Daily Mail, the Swift patriarch went to Justin’s team to reveal that Ryan Reynolds’ wife threatened to leak Taylor’s texts if she didn’t show her support to Blake in her feud with the Jane the Virgin breakout star.
“Scott Swift did not want his daughter to be dragged into this any further and he voluntarily gave up this information as part of a deal that would include [Baldoni’s team] withdrawing their subpoena for Taylor,” a source told the British tabloid newspaper.
Justin’s lawyer, Bryan Freedman, reportedly revealed the alleged threat in a court filing last week, claiming Blake’s lawyer, Michael Gottlieb from Willkie Farr, brought the demand to Taylor’s law firm, Venable.
Allegedly, the documents claimed Gottlieb asked Taylor to “release a statement of support for Ms. Lively, intimating that, if Ms. Swift refused to do so, private text messages of a personal nature in Ms. Lively’s possession would be released.”
The documents also claimed that Blake demanded Taylor to “delete their messages.”
Freedman added that he spent an hour on talking to a “person very closely linked” to Taylor on the phone and this person was said to have revealed the information taken on court.
At the time, Scott’s identity was not unveiled yet.
How Did Blake Lively’s Camp Respond to Justin Baldoni’s Lawyer?
Meanwhile, Gottlieb denied that claims of Justin’s lawyer, telling Page Six that the allegations were “cowardly sourced to supposed anonymous sources and completely untethered from reality.”
However, an insider sided with Freedman, telling Daily Mail that Blake’s camp seemed to be trying to extort Taylor by “threatening to release private information about her in order to pressure her into supporting a narrative she was not a part of.”
This isn’t the first time that someone from Taylor’s side made a move against Blake’s team. To recall, news broke that Travis unfollowed Ryan on Instagram amid the ongoing legal drama.
Though some claim it may hint at a breakup between Taylor and Travis, it actually shows the NFL star’s support for his girlfriend.
For starters, the conflict centers on the $400 million lawsuit Justin filed against Blake, her husband Ryan, their publicist Leslie Sloane, and Sloane’s PR firm, Vision PR, Inc., citing claims of civil extortion, defamation, and more.
Though Taylor has no direct involvement, she was unexpectedly drawn into the case after being subpoenaed as a potential witness and mentioned in private messages submitted to the court.
As this puts the Grammy Award-winner into an unwanted spotlight, it has reportedly had a major impact on her relationship with Blake.
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