Who is Jed Wallace? Blake Lively sued again in Justin Baldoni It Ends With Us case

Another twist has emerged in the ongoing It Ends With Us case. This time, a man named Jed Wallace has sued Blake Lively, but who is he and what is his involvement with Justin Baldoni?

The controversy surrounding the Colleen Hoover adaptation It Ends With Us first went viral when the movie dropped last summer, kicking off with rumors of a falling out between the cast, led by Lively, and director/star Baldoni. 

This reached fever pitch at the end of 2024: Lively accused Baldoni of sexual harassment, while the New York Times accused his PR team of orchestrating a smear campaign. However, Baldoni has since sued Lively and Ryan Reynolds for $400m, and the NYT for $250m.

Baldoni’s team published a website featuring a detailed timeline of events, which has since led to backlash towards Lively and Reynolds. Although the trial isn’t set to start until March 2026, a new lawsuit has been added to the mix. 

Who is Jed Wallace?

Jed Wallace is the owner of the crisis public relations firm Street Relations. He lives in Texas, where the business is situated, and is a private person, so much so that there appears to be no images of Wallace available online. 

NYT

Lively’s initial complaint named Wallace but he’s not named in her lawsuit

In his lawsuit, he explains that his firm helps clients to navigate real-life human crises, threats, trauma, and mental health concerns. Clients are often either families or individuals who find themselves unjustly attacked, extorted, doxed, swatted, or scammed.

Wallace was accused of being hired by Baldoni’s crisis communications specialist Melissa Nathan and the firm she runs, The Agency Group PR, to “weaponize a digital army” in a bid to take down Blake Lively. 

In December 2024, before Baldoni took legal action, Lively filed a complaint against Baldoni and associated parties, claiming sexual harassment among other allegations. 

Wallace was named as a defendant. The document reads, “The retaliation campaign relied on more than just publicists and crisis managers spinning stories. 

Lionsgate

“They also retained subcontractors, including a Texas-based contractor named Jed Wallace, who weaponized a digital army around the country from New York to Los Angeles to create, seed, and promote content that appeared to be authentic on social media platforms and internet chat forums. 

“The Baldoni-Wayfarer team would then feed pieces of this manufactured content to unwitting reporters, making content go viral in order to influence public opinion and thereby cause an organic pile on.”

Wallace is also mentioned in the New York Times, which reads, “Jed Wallace, a self-described ‘hired gun,’ led a digital strategy that included boosting social media posts that could help their cause.”

However, after Baldoni sued the NYT, Lively retaliated by filing an official lawsuit against him – but in this document, Wallace is no longer a defendant. 

Why is he suing Lively?

Jed Wallace is suing Lively for defamation, seeking $7 million in damages. In his lawsuit, filed in a Texas federal court on February 4, he claims he didn’t engage in harassment or retaliation of the Gossip Girl star.

Sony

The 10-page document states that due to the media coverage of Lively’s preliminary complaint, Wallace and Street Relations were widely reported to be defendants in her lawsuit, despite the fact that they’re not. 

“As Lively later admitted, she knew of no facts to support the allegations against Wallace or Street,” the document states. 

“Indeed, having been the one harassed, she knew the exact opposite. Neither Wallace nor Street had anything to do with the alleged sexual harassment, retaliation, failure to investigate or aiding and abetting the alleged harassment or alleged retaliation.”

Ultimately, the statements made by Lively and her team against Wallace and Street are accused of being “false, defamatory, made with either negligence or ‘actual malice’ and have caused millions of dollars in reputational harm.”

The complaint goes on to say that Lively “knew (and knows) that they were not the harassers/retaliators but made these allegations anyway, leaked them to the press hoping they would be widely republished (which they were) but then excluded plaintiffs from the formal lawsuit (knowing they had nothing to do with the events depicted therein).”

Wallace’s lawyer, Charles Babcock, told THR in a statement, “Mr. Wallace, who is a very private person, has never met or spoken to Ms. Lively. Ever. He has not engaged in a smear campaign against her at any point in time. 

“The decision to file this lawsuit to rightfully protect himself and his family was made after Ms. Lively not only filed against him first in Texas but indicated she intended to name him in yet another lawsuit.”

Lively’s lawyers respond to the lawsuit

Lively’s lawyers, led by Michael Gottlieb, have since clapped back at Wallace’s complaint. They said in a statement: “Another day, another state, another nine-figure lawsuit seeking to sue Ms. Lively ‘into oblivion’ for speaking out against sexual harassment and retaliation.

“This is not just a publicity stunt – it is transparent retaliation in response to allegations contained within a sexual harassment and retaliation complaint that Ms. Lively filed with the California Civil Rights Department. 

“While this lawsuit will be dismissed, we are pleased that Mr. Wallace has finally emerged from the shadows, and that he too will be held accountable in federal court.”

For more on the case, read the alleged texts from Lively to Baldoni, why Taylor Swift was dragged into it, and the gag order request.