Universal Music Group is making moves to get Drake’s defamation suit dismissed again. The company said a response to the rapper’s appeal that his argument would “critically undermine” rap, “a highly creative art form built on exaggeration, insult, and wordplay.”
“[Drake] seeks to strip words from their context and deem them actionable defamation if anyone, anywhere, might treat them as factual,” UMG’s lawyers wrote, per Rolling Stone.
The response comes as Drake continues to pursue his case against the music corporation for releasing Kendrick Lamar’s “Not Like Us.” The Grammy Award-winning diss accuses the Canadian artist of appropriating hip hop and being a pedophile in its lyrics. Judge Jeannette A. Vargas dismissed the suit in October 2025, calling Lamar’s lyrics insinuating pedophilia as “non-actionable opinion” rather than a matter of fact in her opinion.
Following the suit’s dismissal, the rapper filed an appeal in January, once again arguing that “Not Like Us” was damaging to his reputation.
Drake’s attorneys wrote, “Millions of people understood [‘Not Like Us’] to convey factual information, causing countless individuals around the globe to believe that Drake was a pedophile.”
On Friday (March 27), UMG issued its response to the “Hotline Bling” rapper.
“That is not the law, and Drake’s view would critically undermine a highly creative art form built on exaggeration, insult, and wordplay.”
UMG also pointed out that in his disses toward Lamar, Drake accused the Compton rapper of physically abusing his girlfriend and raising a child that wasn’t his.
“’Not Like Us’ falls within a genre typified by inflammatory putdowns, epithets, fiery rhetoric, vulgarity, and hyperbole,” UMG’s lawyers write. “Drake’s attempt to rip the words he now dislikes from their immediate and broader context has no support in governing law.”
