{"id":4514,"date":"2025-03-05T05:50:54","date_gmt":"2025-03-05T05:50:54","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/usatrustedlawyers.com\/blog\/drake-lawyers-cite-kendrick-lamar-super-bowl-halftime-show-in-lawsuit\/"},"modified":"2025-03-05T05:50:54","modified_gmt":"2025-03-05T05:50:54","slug":"drake-lawyers-cite-kendrick-lamar-super-bowl-halftime-show-in-lawsuit","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/usatrustedlawyers.com\/blog\/drake-lawyers-cite-kendrick-lamar-super-bowl-halftime-show-in-lawsuit\/","title":{"rendered":"Drake Lawyers Cite Kendrick Lamar Super Bowl Halftime Show in Lawsuit"},"content":{"rendered":"\n
\n

\n\tA<\/span> federal judge is refusing to allow Universal Music Group (UMG) to delay the start of Drake\u2019s defamation lawsuit over Kendrick Lamar\u2019s \u201cNot Like Us\u201d \u2014 a decision that came after Drake\u2019s lawyers filed court documents complaining about Lamar\u2019s Super Bowl halftime show.<\/p>\n

\n\tIn a decision issued Tuesday (Mar. 4), Judge Jeannette Vargas<\/strong> denied UMG\u2019s bid to postpone an initial hearing set for next month. The judge said that if UMG wants to push back the case \u2014 which claims \u201cNot Like Us\u201d defamed Drake by calling him a pedophile \u2014 it can argue for that request at the April hearing.<\/p>\n

\n\tThe procedural ruling came after Drake\u2019s attorneys warned that further delays to the lawsuit would be unfair to their client, who they say is facing ongoing harm as the case works through the courts. In doing so, they cited one eye-catching piece of evidence: Lamar\u2019s Super Bowl show.<\/p>\n

\n\t\u201cDelaying discovery would unfairly prejudice plaintiff, who is continuing to suffer the consequences of UMG\u2019s defamatory campaign,\u201d Drake\u2019s lawyers wrote. \u201cAt the same time UMG has been delaying here, UMG launched new campaigns to further spread the defamatory content, including at the 2025 Super Bowl halftime show, which had over 133.5 million viewers.\u201d<\/p>\n

\n\tDrake\u2019s motion, filed last week, was the lawsuit\u2019s first reference to the halftime show, in which Lamar avoided saying the word \u201cpedophile\u201d but otherwise directly attacked his rival. Since the Super Bowl, industry watchers have speculated over whether Lamar\u2019s performance might spark additional legal claims or be used as fresh legal ammo by Drake\u2019s legal team.<\/p>\n

\n\tLamar released \u201cNot Like Us\u201d last May amid a high-profile beef with Drake that saw the two stars exchange stinging diss tracks. The song, a knock-out punch that blasted Drake as a \u201ccertified pedophile\u201d over an infectious beat, eventually became a chart-topping hit in its own right.<\/p>\n

\n\tIn January, Drake sued UMG over \u201cNot Like Us,\u201d claiming the label had defamed him by boosting the track\u2019s popularity. The lawsuit, which doesn\u2019t name Lamar himself as a defendant, claims that UMG \u201cwaged a campaign\u201d against its own artist to spread a \u201cmalicious narrative\u201d about pedophilia that it knew to be false.<\/p>\n

\n\tUMG has strongly denied the lawsuit\u2019s allegations, saying that it would be \u201cillogical\u201d for the company to conspire against one of its own artists in whom it had made a \u201cmassive\u201d investment.<\/p>\n

\n\t\u201cWe have not and do not engage in defamation\u2014against any individual,\u201d UMG said in its statement. \u201cAt the same time, we will vigorously defend this litigation to protect our people and our reputation, as well as any artist who might directly or indirectly become a frivolous litigation target for having done nothing more that write a song.\u201d<\/p>\n

\n\tIn the lead up the Super Bowl, it was unclear if Lamar would play the song under a cloud of looming litigation. But when he took the stage on Feb. 9, he mocked the lawsuit and rapped the song\u2019s key lyrical insults, including the line, \u201csay, Drake, I hear you like \u2019em young.\u201d<\/p>\n

\n\tIn a motion last month, UMG\u2019s attorneys asked Judge Vargas to postpone the April hearing, arguing that the company would soon move to dismiss the case and that any exchanges of evidence (known as discovery) would be \u201cpremature\u201d if the case were going to be tossed out entirely.<\/p>\n

\n\tDrake\u2019s lawyers quickly responded, claiming UMG was unfairly trying to halt the case without actually asking the judge: \u201cUMG has neither moved to dismiss nor moved for a stay of discovery, and its attempt to achieve the latter by delaying the former are inappropriate.\u201d<\/p>\n

\n\tOn Tuesday, Judge Vargas sided with Drake\u2019s team, saying that it is \u201cnot the practice of this Court to routinely stay discovery pending the outcome of a motion to dismiss.\u201d She said that UMG can seek to postpone discovery at the hearing, which is now set for April 2.<\/p>\n

\n\tIn a statement to Billboard<\/em>, Drake\u2019s legal team celebrated Tuesday\u2019s decision: \u201cWe are pleased with the Court\u2019s decision to reject UMG\u2019s continued attempts to stall discovery\u2014another clear sign that UMG cannot run from or bury the truth. This ruling, along with our motion for discovery in Texas yesterday, together represent major steps forward in holding UMG accountable to shareholders and artists for their\u00a0repeated and egregious\u00a0actions.\u201d<\/p>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

A federal judge is refusing to allow Universal Music Group (UMG) to delay the start of Drake\u2019s defamation lawsuit over Kendrick Lamar\u2019s \u201cNot Like Us\u201d \u2014 a decision […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":4515,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[6],"tags":[4535,4924,441,4925,402,403,303,7,2280,2046],"class_list":["post-4514","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-lawyers","tag-bowl","tag-cite","tag-drake","tag-halftime","tag-kendrick","tag-lamar","tag-lawsuit","tag-lawyers","tag-show","tag-super"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/usatrustedlawyers.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4514","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/usatrustedlawyers.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/usatrustedlawyers.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/usatrustedlawyers.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/usatrustedlawyers.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=4514"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/usatrustedlawyers.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4514\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/usatrustedlawyers.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/4515"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/usatrustedlawyers.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=4514"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/usatrustedlawyers.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=4514"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/usatrustedlawyers.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=4514"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}