Drake Amends Defamation Lawsuit Against UMG To Include Kendrick Lamar's Super Bowl LIX Performance

Drake is doubling down on the defamation lawsuit against the Universal Music Group label with a new amendment. The most recent update sees The Boy include details that involve Kendrick Lamar‘s Super Bowl LIX performance which was the most-watched halftime show in history.

Earlier this week, Drake’s team filed the amendment which states that K Dot’s performance of his hit song “Not Like Us” propelled the false and defamatory allegations against him. The song had originally ignited the legal actions taken by Drake against UMG. Back in January, he sued UMG for the diss track, alleging that the record company, “approved, published, and launched a campaign to create a viral hit out of a rap track that falsely accuses Drake of being a pedophile and calls for violent retribution against him.” He also cited a shooting at his Toronto residence in May 2024 where one of his security guards were wounded. The amended lawsuit also draws attention to the increasing threats Drake and his family are enduring after the song was performed at the Super Bowl.

The lawsuit reads, “The Recording was performed during the 2025 Super Bowl and broadcast to the largest audience for a Super Bowl halftime show ever, over 133 million people, including millions of children, and millions more who had never before heard the song or any of the songs that preceded it. It was the first, and will hopefully be the last, Super Bowl halftime show orchestrated to assassinate the character of another artist.” The lawsuit does make note that the song performed omitted words like “pedophile,” however, Drake claims that the censoring is not enough. After “Not Like Us” made it back to No. 1 on the Billboard 100 the following week after the Super Bowl, Drake has amended the suit to also include Kendrick’s 2025 Grammy performance, citing both instances as re-intensifying the defamatory claims. Drake’s lead attorney, Michael Gottlieb, said in a statement, “Drake’s amended complaint makes an already strong case stronger. UMG’s PR ‘spin’ and failed efforts to avoid discovery cannot suppress the facts and the truth. With discovery now moving forward, Drake will expose the evidence of UMG’s misconduct, and UMG will be held accountable for the consequences of its ill-conceived decisions.”

UMG has given their own response to the amendments, “Drake, unquestionably one of the world’s most accomplished artists and with whom we’ve enjoyed a 16-year successful relationship, is being misled by his legal representatives into taking one absurd legal step after another.” The Boy’s team releases their own statement sharing,

“UMG’s latest statement is a desperate attempt to spin the narrative and deflect from the truth: Drake is holding the largest music conglomerate in the world accountable for its actions and doing so without fear.

We dismissed the Texas discovery action because discovery will now proceed in New York. That’s not retreat, that’s victory. UMG dismissed its first amendment petition in Texas because it has no claim, that’s losing. And UMG knows the case against it is only getting stronger.

Drake welcomes discovery and has nothing to hide. It’s not Drake who should worry; it’s UMG’s current leadership. We look forward to hearing from Lucian Grainge, John Janick, and UMG employees under oath.

UMG claims to stand for creativity, but in fact exploits it and the artist community knows that. UMG drains artists for its profits, then discards them. Drake joins a growing chorus of artists raising questions about UMG’s leadership. The public and artists should be concerned about recent headlines involving UMG’s largest stakeholder that only reinforces the need for transparency all the way up to the Board of Director’s level.

UMG said, ‘be careful what you ask for,’ Drake knows exactly what he asked for: the truth and accountability.”