The Hollywood PR Wars: Why Justin Baldoni Will Become a Conservative

Here’s the speculative: A fresh, beautiful lady claims that a legal victimized her. The police investigate her complaints, deem them reliable, and assault the suspect. A jury date has been set.

Now, imagine if the suspect fought back by hiring private prosecutors to pilfer through the person’s personal life, implemented a PR plan to diminish her trust, and tried to dismantle her” reality” via legal, press, and financial pressures.

The people may be offended! Why, you’ve victimized this bad woman half! Have you no sorrow?

Of course, the previously situation happens every single day in America. It’s common legitimate practice in many legal protection cases. Because of the large amount of lawyers, thieves, and patients, the procedure has been normalized.

Typically, at least.

And this brings us to the interested kerfuffle between Hollywood starlet Blake Lively — the “victim” — and actor/director Justin Baldoni. People Magazine offered a conclusion, but for the inexperienced, Blake Lively is a wonderful, talented artist. She’s a real A-lister and one-half of a leading Tinsel Town energy partners, along with her dude,” Deadpool” star Ryan Reynolds.

Justin Baldoni is a gorgeous professional who’s even a producer. In addition to his acting chops, he’s even built his company on being a male female. He even wore a man-bun (yuck ). He did audiobooks, lectures, and Ted Talks to atone for his dangerous manhood:” I believe that as men, it’s time to view past our pleasure and realize that we are not really part of the problem. Fellas, we are the problem”.

Well, according to Blake Lively’s problem, “we” aren’t the problem, “he” is the issue: Beautiful contends that Baldoni barged into her video when she was disrobed, made wildly inappropriate comments about his genitalia and sexual career, criticized her figure and weight, and was generally a creep. So, among other acceptable recompenses, she complained to Baldoni’s production company and requested an intimacy coordinator.

And to Baldoni’s credit, he agreed to all of them. But here’s where things turned dark and disturbing: Lively contends that Baldoni’s PR team retaliated against her, damaged her reputation, hurt her financially, manipulated social media, and turned the public against her. Baldoni refutes these accusations and makes legal claims in response.

I don’t know what happened on the set. We can certainly envision a scenario where Lively was indeed mistreated, maligned, and abused. If so, that’s awful.

But we can also envision a scenario where Lively — a coddled, privileged, wealthy starlet — threw her weight around and threatened to bury Baldoni’s career. If so, it’s understandable why Baldoni would seek preemptive PR assistance.

If you’re gonna be fed to the Hollywood Scandal Machine, you better have a great lawyer AND a great publicist. You need both. And part of a publicist’s job is to anticipate reputational threats, extinguish fires, and preemptively” seed” media outlets to generate favorable coverage.

Lively’s attorneys, it seems, uncovered (via subpoena ) a treasure trove of deeply damaging texts from Baldoni’s PR team, including messages like,” We can bury everyone”. And when The Daily Mail ran the story,” Is Blake Lively Set to Be CANCELED”? You really outdid yourself with this piece, according to an internal message that was allegedly stated in this message.

When you’re a publicist, being subpoenaed is an unnerving experience. ( In certain crisis communications situations, PR agents CC the client’s attorney to keep their work legally protected. It’s unclear if Baldoni’s PR team heeded this protocol. ) It’s discombobulating, because most of the time, you’re worried about a journalist burning your client. &nbsp, But when lawyers seize your emails, texts, and communications, you worry about burning the journalists you work with. A PR professional who isn’t trusted by the media is of little value, which is a real fear.

I’ve only been subpoenaed once: when the Obama administration repped a client in the Gen. David Petraeus CIA scandal, they demanded that I turn over all of my texts and emails. ( I was required to turn over off-the-record communications in writing as well. ) Fortunately, Obama’s attorneys didn’t leak any of my messages because they included jokes, quips, and dopey puns between me and conservative media members. They were meant to be goofy and lighthearted, but, taken out of context, they could’ve cost my friends their jobs.

It was my wake-up call: DO NOT put anything in print ( even if it’s funny! ) that you’d regret seeing published.

That’s because the PR process is similar to the legal process. They all involve preemptive planning, tough talk, aggressive tactics, reputational management, bravado, sharp elbows, and more. The only difference is that legal work has been normalized in Hollywood films and TV shows like” Suits” and “LA Law.” PR is more foreign.

But the tactics are constant.

In the first half of 2025, I’m confident that Justin Baldoni will transition to the conservative camp. The same left-leaning, man-bun-wearing Soy Boy who built his brand by excoriating” toxic masculinity” will be a Johnny Come Lately to conservatism.

He has to.

Blake Lively is more significant than he is. She’s more important. And her PR team has already raised the flag, making it a# MeToo moment that pitted a beautiful, beautiful starlet against a vile, vile male chauvinist pig.

Baldoni could try to regain his feminist turf, but it probably won’t work. Lively’s team had its ducks lined up in a row, it has the first-mover advantage. If you’re an actor, you’re especially susceptible to those kinds of allegations because he’s now viewed as a fraud, someone who pretends to be someone else’s identity. &nbsp,

Acting, after all, is all about pretending to be someone different.

Therefore, his best PR move is to place a ownership stake elsewhere. He needs PR allies, and they’re not going to come from the left-leaning mainstream media anymore. It’s something crypto-fraudster Sam Bankman-Fried considered when his liberal world began to collapse:” Go on Tucker Carlsen]sic], come out as a republican”, he wrote to himself.

And Sam Bankman-Fried was literally the Democrats ‘ second biggest donor!

PR is mostly about trajectory: Your messaging is either working or it’s not. Baldoni’s current trajectory is unsustainable. His career as a mainstream actor-director is over, barring a major court filing that fundamentally alters public opinion.

Unless he switches sides.

Of course, he won’t actually mean it. Baldoni’s newfound conversion to conservatism will be purely performative: He’s just playing a different part.

That’s what actors do.

Source credit