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A new development has emerged in Blake Lively and Justin Baldoni's ongoing film It Ends With Us controversy. A federal judge in New York has granted actor-filmmaker Baldoni permission to access the text messages exchanged between Lively and Taylor Swift that are related to the movie and the ongoing legal dispute. This decision comes after Lively attempted to prevent Baldoni from obtaining such messages, claiming he was involving Taylor in the lawsuit for publicity.

On Wednesday, Judge Lewis Liman denied the request of Blake Lively to prevent Justin Baldoni from accessing her texts. Liman stated that such messages might play a crucial role in the case and also requested that they be prevented from leaking to the press, as quoted by Variety.

The judge wrote in his order, "A motion or request may be, and in this case often has been, both a legitimate litigation tactic and an attempt to manoeuvre in the broader court of public opinion."

Baldoni's team had initially subpoenaed Taylor Swift and her lawyers, but Swift's spokesman claimed she had no involvement with the film beyond licensing a song and hadn't seen it until weeks after its release. Although Swift's team tried to quash the subpoenas and Baldoni's side withdrew them, Lively's team later attempted to dismiss Swift's relevance to the case. However, the judge disagreed, ultimately ruling that Baldoni could access messages between Swift and Lively, as per Variety report.

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“Given that Lively has represented that Swift had knowledge of complaints or discussions about the working environment on the film, among other issues, the requests for messages with Swift regarding the film and this action are reasonably tailored to discover information that would prove or disprove Lively’s harassment and retaliation claims,” the judge announced.

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Blake Lively And Justin Baldoni Controversy

Lively accused Baldoni and his publicists in December last year, by claiming that they were spreading false news against her online and in the press after she raised her voice about sexual harassment on the set of the film. In this matter, Baldoni filed a countersuit, accusing her of ruining his reputation with such allegations. However, the case was dismissed last week.