Andy Cohen Moves To Have Leah McSweeney's Lawsuit Against Him Tossed

Bravo star Andy Cohen is standing on business regarding Leah McSweeney's scathing allegations against him and the famous network.

According to legal documents obtained by The Blast, the "Watch What Happens Live!" host kept his promise to fight against McSweeney's claims in court. Through their attorneys, Cohen and other defendants have filed a motion to dismiss the former Bravolebrity's lawsuit.

Cohen, the producers, network, distributors, and specific individuals who worked on the "Real Housewives of New York" and "The Real Housewives Ultimate Girls Trip" are named as defendants in McSweeney's lawsuit.

The list includes Lisa Shannon, John Paparazzo, Darren Ward, Warner Bros. Discovery, Inc., Shed Media US Inc., NBCUniversal Media LLC, and Bravo Media LLC. 

These defendants, through their attorneys, argued that McSweeney's complaints should be dismissed for multiple reasons. The documents alleged:

"While Plaintiff attempts to overwhelm with a 754-paragraph complaint, even a cursory review of her allegations reveals that many concern matters entirely irrelevant to her claims and most are devoid of any factual or legal support, speculative, misleading, and/or demonstrably false."

Cohen's defense team claimed that many of McSweeney's complaints were supported by "the most conclusory and threadbare allegations" and should be dismissed as a matter of law.

As for the rest of the former Housewife's claims of discrimination, they needed to be tossed because:

"They impermissibly seek to abridge Defendants' First Amendment rights to tailor and adjust the messages they wish to convey in their creative works, including through cast selection and other creative decisions."

Cohen's defense team came prepared as they slammed McSweeney's allegations one after the other with interesting arguments. First, they tackled her shocking claims that the defendants had influenced her alcohol relapse in favor of ratings.

The former Bravolebrity accused Cohen's camp of directing cast members to say offensive comments to her on-camera and declining to cast her on future seasons of "RHONY" because they preferred showing castmates that take alcohol.

However, the defendants refuted these allegations and claimed that even if they were true, they fell under "creative expression." Therefore, McSweeney's complaints should be dismissed per their First Amendment defense.

"Decisions about what to say or not say in an expressive work, as well as 'casting decisions,' are 'part and parcel of the creative process,' and therefore merit First Amendment protection against the application of anti-discrimination statutes to that process," Cohen's camp argued.

In her scathing lawsuit, McSweeney accused Cohen's corner of multiple offenses such as sex/gender discrimination and religious discrimination. However, the defendants noted that her sex/gender-based claims were about three alleged incidents.

These incidents involved two comments Cohen allegedly made on-air during a "RHONY" reunion show in the fall of 2020 and one private text message he sent in December 2020 in response to McSweeney's social media post.

Cohen's defense argued that the alleged comments were time-barred under the law, while the text message was "far too trivial" to support McSweeney's sex/gender-based claims.

As for the religious discrimination, they argued that the unavailability of a non-pork option at an event was insufficient to back her claims by law.

Two months before Cohen's camp filed to dismiss McSweeney's complaints, The Blast reported she had addressed the unfolding drama. During an interview in March, the former reality TV star claimed her intentions were pure, saying:

"As hard as it is to be going up against a very powerful entity, and for people to maybe also just not agree with me or, you know, come at me and get blowback and all the things, I don't care because this is the truth. I have it on my side, and my intentions are really good."

Despite noting that she didn't care about those against her, McSweeney confessed it was challenging dealing with the backlash.

"Even when you're in a really good place, it still hurts. It's still not an enjoyable experience to have people coming at you or be dealing with the situation that I'm in," she lamented.

In March,The Blast reported that Cohen's team had threatened to sue McSweeney for defamation. They cautioned the former Housewife to retract her false claims or be ready to face them in court.

"To be clear: these allegations are categorically false. Mr. Cohen never used cocaine with any cast member on any Real Housewives show or with any other Bravo employee," the TV host's attorneys argued in a letter.

"The truth matters. Litigation cannot be used to create fake news. And it cannot be used as a vehicle to spread false and malicious lies, in furtherance of a shakedown," they continued, adding the warning:

"We demand that you issue an immediate public retraction and apologize to Mr. Cohen. Every day you fail to do so only increases the damages suffered by Mr. Cohen."