Live: Kai Cenat's company and Night Media face a $330,000 federal suit over the Streamer University auditions

Disclosure: the plaintiff in this case, Caleb Gottfried, is the editor of NVR.news and the founder of its publisher. He did not write or edit this story. It was assembled by the desk from the public record and from third-party reports, each of which is listed in the sources box, and the defendants are invited to reply at the address on the masthead.

Kai Cenat LLC, the corporate entity of the live-streamer Kai Cenat, and Night Media, Inc., the talent-management company that manages him, are defendants in a federal lawsuit over the in-person auditions for the second season of Streamer University, held on June 12, 2026 at John Jay College of Criminal Justice in Manhattan.

What the complaint says

The complaint was filed on June 26, 2026 in the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of New York by Caleb Gottfried, an independent musician who records as SNVRK and a New Jersey resident, representing himself. According to reports of the filing by TMZ, theJasmineBRAND and others, it seeks $330,000 in compensatory damages, punitive damages, litigation costs and further relief.

The complaint alleges that attendees, some of whom had queued overnight for the free event, were moved into an enclosed area with inadequate ventilation and insufficient crowd control, and that Gottfried suffered two episodes he describes as near heatstroke. The filing, as quoted in those reports, attributes the episodes to "negligent crowd control and total failure to provide standard safety and ventilation measures."

It further alleges that organisers filmed attendees and used Gottfried's likeness as unpaid "background talent" in promotional content without his permission. The two theories, crowd safety and right of publicity, are the claims pleaded.

Where the case stands

The case was opened before Chief Judge Laura Taylor Swain, who granted Gottfried leave to proceed without paying the filing fee. It was then assigned to District Judge Dale E. Ho, with general pretrial matters referred to Magistrate Judge Robert W. Lehrburger. Kai Cenat LLC was served on July 16, and its response was due on August 6, according to the reports.

As of publication, NVR.news had not seen an answer, a motion or any other response from either defendant in the public reports it reviewed. The docket is the authority on that, not the coverage, and this story will be updated from it.

Neither Kai Cenat LLC nor Night Media has commented publicly on the complaint in the reports NVR.news reviewed. Either may reach the editor at the address on the masthead, and any reply will be added here in full.

The event

Streamer University is Cenat's creator bootcamp, first held in 2025. The 2026 season selected a class of 120 creators from what organisers described as millions of applications, through a process that included in-person auditions in New York, Los Angeles and Atlanta. The New York auditions were free and drew a crowd large enough that some attendees camped overnight. The season itself went ahead and wrapped on July 20.

The complaint's crowd-safety theory rests on foreseeability, and the history it points to is public: a giveaway Cenat promoted in Union Square in August 2023 ended in arrests and charges after the crowd outgrew the space. That episode is not part of this case and proves nothing about what happened at John Jay; it is the context a court would be asked to weigh.

What has not been decided

Nothing. An allegation in a complaint is an allegation. A grant of leave to proceed without the fee addresses ability to pay, not whether a claim is good, and the defendants have been found liable for nothing.