Justin Baldoni's production company Wayfarer Studios LLC was sued by The New York Times in September 2025 over a dismissed defamation case against the publication. Baldoni and Wayfarer originally sued The New York Times for $250 million in December 2024 over accusations that the outlet libeled the actor in its coverage of Blake Lively's sexual harassment suit against her It Ends With Us director and costar. Baldoni and his associates alleged that The New York Times "cherry-picked" information to mislead readers about his dispute with Lively in its December 2024 article "We Can Bury Anyone: Inside a Hollywood Smear Machine." The New York Times has consistently stood behind its reporting. A significant legal setback for Baldoni and Wayfarer took place in June 2025 when Judge Lewis J. Liman dismissed both Baldoni's defamation suit against The New York Times and his $400 million countersuit against Lively. Three months later, The New York Times started legal proceedings against Wayfarer to recoup at least $150,000 in costs associated with Baldoni's dismissed legal action, according to court documents obtained by Us Weekly. Justin Baldoni Breaks Silence, Returns to Instagram With Emotional Post Keep scrolling for a full rundown of the case. Why Did Justin Baldoni Sue The New York Times? Us confirmed that Baldoni and Wayfarer were among a group of 10 plaintiffs - also including publicists Melissa Nathan and Jennifer Abel, plus It Ends With Us producers James Heath and Steve Saraowitz - who began legal proceedings against The New York Times over its December 2024 article "We Can Bury Anyone: Inside a Hollywood Smear Machine." Chief among their complaints was that The New York Times and its reporters Megan Twohey, Mike McIntire and Julie Tate supposedly "cherry-picked and altered communications stripped of necessary context" to make Lively look more favorable in her sexual harassment suit against Baldoni. The lawsuit accused Lively - who the actor also countersued at the same time - of engaging in a "strategic and manipulative" media campaign by creating false "sexual harassment allegations to assert unilateral control over every aspect of the production [of It Ends With Us]." "The Times story relied almost entirely on Lively's unverified and self-serving narrative, lifting it nearly verbatim while disregarding an abundance of evidence that contradicted her claims and exposed her true motives," Baldoni and his fellow plaintiffs alleged in their lawsuit. Blake Lively and Justin Baldoni are filming 'It Ends with Us' in January 2024. Jose Perez/Bauer-Griffin/GC Images Baldoni specifically rebutted accusations in the Times article that he repeatedly entered Lively's It Ends With Us trailer while she was breast-feeding and once showed her a "pornographic video" featuring a fellow producer's wife. "This claim is patently absurd," Baldoni's legal team insisted in their suit. "The video in question was a (non-pornographic) recording of [producer Jamey Heath's] wife during a home birth - a deeply personal one with no sexual overtone. To distort this benign event into an act of sexual misconduct is outrageous and emblematic of the lengths to which Lively and her collaborators are willing to go to defame plaintiffs." In response to Wayfarer's defamation suit, a New York Times spokesperson told Us that the role of "an independent news organization is to follow the facts where they lead." Judge Unseals Texts and Emails in Justin Baldoni and Blake Lively Lawsuit "Our story was meticulously and responsibly reported. It was based on a review of thousands of pages of original documents, including the text messages and emails that we quote accurately and at length in the article," a rep for the outlet responded. "Those texts and emails were also the crux of a discrimination claim filed in California by Blake Lively against Justin Baldoni and his associates." According to the spokesperson, The New York Times planned to "vigorously defend against the lawsuit." Why Was Justin Baldoni's Lawsuit Against The New York Times Dismissed? Baldoni was dealt a double blow in June 2025 when Judge Liman dismissed both his lawsuit against The New York Times and his $400 million countersuit against Lively. "The Wayfarer Parties have not alleged that Lively is responsible for any statements other than the statements in her CRD complaint, which are privileged," Judge Liman ruled in his opinion and order filing on June 9. "The Wayfarer Parties have alleged that [Lively's husband Ryan] Reynolds and [publicist Leslie] Sloane made additional statements accusing Baldoni of sexual misconduct and that the Times made additional statements accusing the Wayfarer Parties of engaging in a smear campaign." The judge went on, "But the Wayfarer Parties have not alleged that Reynolds, Sloane or the Times would have seriously doubted these statements were true based on the information available to them, as is required for them to be liable for defamation under applica