Harvey Weinstein Inserts Himself Into Blake Lively Drama

From behind bars, Harvey Weinstein is providing his help to the embattled actor-director whereas likening Baldoni’s state of affairs to his personal.

The convicted rapist, presently serving over a decade in jail for a number of intercourse crimes, instructed TMZ on Wednesday that he believes Baldoni has been unfairly focused by The New York Occasions.

The outlet’s December 2024 exposé, “‘We Can Bury Anybody’: Inside a Hollywood Smear Machine,” included partial messages from Baldoni’s PR staff that appeared to counsel they may “bury anybody,” together with Vigorous, in what was portrayed as a calculated smear campaign.

Baldoni and his staff fired again with a $250 million libel lawsuit towards the Occasions, accusing the publication of misrepresenting personal messages, which they allege had been “cherry-picked” and manipulated to suit a false narrative.

“Watching Justin Baldoni take authorized motion towards the New York Occasions and its reporters, accusing them of manipulating communications and ignoring proof that countered Ms. Vigorous’s claims, hit me exhausting,” Weinstein mentioned. “It introduced again every thing I skilled when the Occasions reported on me in 2017. They did the identical factor: cherry-picked what match their story and ignored important context and details that would have challenged the narrative.”

Weinstein’s reference factors on to the Pulitzer Prize-winning investigation that uncovered a long time of sexual abuse allegations towards him, reporting that helped ignite the #MeToo movement.

In response to Weinstein’s newest statements, The New York Occasions defended the integrity of its reporting.

“Our complete investigation into the allegations of sexual harassment and abuse towards Mr. Weinstein was rigorously reported over many months and primarily based on on-the-record interviews, authorized settlements paid to accusers and different paperwork,” spokesperson Danielle Rhoades mentioned.

“Not one of the details in our protection are in dispute. Mr. Weinstein acknowledged his misconduct in a press release that was revealed in full in The Times,” Rhoades added. “He’s since been criminally convicted of rape and sexual assault.”

Weinstein’s 2020 New York conviction was overturned in 2024, however a retrial is about for April 15.

He’s additionally interesting a separate 16-year sentence from his 2023 California conviction for forcible rape and different prices.

“I ought to have stood up and fought again then. I ought to have had the braveness to talk out towards the way in which the reality was twisted. That failure nonetheless haunts me,” Weinstein mentioned on Wednesday.

He additionally added that he shall be “watching Baldoni and Vigorous’s case intently,” suggesting that the result “issues to anybody who’s ever been on the receiving finish of a media takedown.”

Weinstein’s public endorsement of Baldoni comes as a shock to many, contemplating his previous connection to each Vigorous and her interior circle. The 2 had been as soon as photographed collectively at public occasions, and in 2014, Page Six reported that Weinstein shared the identical publicist as Vigorous, Leslie Sloane.

Sources on the time claimed Weinstein and MSG government Jim Dolan financially backed Sloane’s transition into founding her personal publicity agency, Imaginative and prescient PR. Weinstein was even quoted saying, “Leslie’s subsequent transfer goes to rock the business.”

However a rep for Sloane now disputes any suggestion of a working relationship with the disgraced producer. “Leslie Sloane by no means represented Harvey Weinstein,” the spokesperson instructed Web page Six. “In 2014, after Sloane left BWR, she and Weinstein engaged in preliminary discussions regarding a possible working relationship with their firms however that by no means got here to fruition.”