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Kelly Yazdi shared a statement on Instagram shortly after her estranged husband, Zac Brown, filed for a temporary restraining order because of Yazdi’s Instagram posts that are allegedly damaging to him and violate a confidentiality agreement. Brown filed for a temporary restraining order on Friday (May 17) in Fulton County, Georgia. Yazdi shared a video on Instagram with a caption on Sunday (May 19). She wrote in her statement:
“No one — not even Zac Brown with all of his money, power, celebrity, and lawyers – may silence my right to freely express myself through art or, although I have to date declined to do so publicly, to speak about the circumstances of our pending divorce. I intend to respond swiftly and robustly to his meritless complaint that publication of two poems on my personal social media account divulged any ‘confidential information’ about his business, much less authorizes a court to enjoin me from speaking about matters in my personal life that have nothing to do with my brief former work for the Zac Brown Collective, Inc.
“It is beyond ironic that Zac’s first act after filing an unnecessary public divorce lawsuit was to release a music video that deliberately mocked our wedding party from only a few months before — including a false and defamatory caricature obviously intended to be me and hurt me – followed by a second unnecessary and legally meritless public lawsuit and press release, yet he now claims his ‘only hope’ is that we show each other ‘mutual respect’ by keeping ‘private matters private’ as we negotiate the terms of our divorce.
“In a misguided effort to do just that, I have made no public response to either of those very public, very unnecessary personal attacks on me by my celebrity soon-to-be-ex-husband. But it is clearly Zac, not me, who has strategically chosen to drag our difficult divorce negotiations into the public eye with these tactics in an effort to portray himself as a victim and to use his vast resources to silence me from telling the truth about our marriage. It will not work, and I will not be silenced by him no matter how ridiculous his tactics.
“Like Zac, I have lawyers too, and I will tell my truth in court — where he has unnecessarily dragged me.”
The Zac Brown Band frontman said in a statement to PEOPLE and other news outlets over the weekend that he “took the steps necessary to enforce an agreement between us to maintain personal and business affairs in confidence and to protect my family from online harassment and speculation. My only hope is for us to keep private matters private and to move forward with the mutual respect we had agreed to show one another when we parted ways.” Yazdi would be ordered to remove the Instagram posts if Brown’s filing is granted. In particular, a post earlier this month appears to refer to her relationship with Brown, though the person she refers to is never mentioned by name.
Brown and Yazdi separated only four months after getting married. They confirmed in a statement in December 2023 that “we are in the process of divorce. Our mutual respect for one another remains. We wish each other the best and will always appreciate our time together. As we navigate this personal matter, we simply request privacy during this time."