Drake’s legal fight with Universal Music Group over Kendrick Lamar’s “Not Like Us” is headed before a federal appeals court Dec. 4, when a three-judge panel will hear his bid to revive the defamation lawsuit dismissed last year.
The U.S. Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit scheduled oral arguments after months of written briefing from Drake and UMG. The hearing will give attorneys their first opportunity to answer questions directly from the judges deciding whether the case should return to the lower court.
Drake, whose legal name is Aubrey Drake Graham, sued his longtime record label in January 2025 over UMG’s release and promotion of Lamar’s chart-topping diss track. His complaint alleged that the company knowingly promoted a false narrative accusing him of being a pedophile despite knowing the accusation was untrue.
UMG denied wrongdoing and argued that the lyrics were protected artistic expression delivered during an escalating rap battle. The lawsuit targets the label’s conduct surrounding the song rather than Lamar himself.
U.S. District Judge Jeannette Vargas dismissed the case in October 2025 after concluding that the challenged lyrics were nonactionable opinion when considered in the context of the feud between the two rappers.
Vargas described “Not Like Us” as part of an exchange filled with insults, threats and hyperbole and found that listeners would understand the song within that combative setting rather than as literal factual reporting.
Drake’s attorneys are now asking the Second Circuit to reverse that ruling. They argue that the district court went too far by using the rap-battle context to treat the accusations as opinion and warn that the decision creates what they call an “unprecedented and overbroad categorical rule” for statements made in diss tracks.
His appeal also argues that listeners could have understood Lamar’s accusations as factual, particularly as “Not Like Us” moved far beyond the original feud and became one of the defining hits of the period.
The song topped the Billboard Hot 100, won five Grammy Awards, including record and song of the year, and later became a centerpiece of Lamar’s Super Bowl halftime performance.
UMG has urged the Second Circuit to uphold the dismissal. Its attorneys maintain that the lyrics must be evaluated in the setting in which they were released, pointing to the inflammatory accusations, insults, and exaggeration traded by both rappers during their highly publicized feud.
The label has also argued that Drake’s position could expose diss tracks and other artistic works to broader defamation liability when provocative lyrics are interpreted literally.
Legal scholars and social scientists have filed briefs supporting UMG, arguing that courts may consider cultural and artistic context when determining whether a statement can reasonably be understood as asserting a fact. Among those backing the label are the Floyd Abrams Institute for Freedom of Expression at Yale and constitutional law scholar Lyrissa Lidsky.
The three appellate judges will ultimately decide whether Vargas properly dismissed Drake’s claims at the pleading stage. They could affirm her ruling, revive some or all of the case, or send specific issues back to the district court for further proceedings.
Oral arguments on Dec. 4 are the next scheduled step in the appeal. Once the hearing ends, the panel will take the case under consideration and issue its decision later, determining whether Drake’s fight with UMG over “Not Like Us” ends with the 2025 dismissal or returns to the federal trial court.
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