Disney lawsuit points to DeSantis book and op-eds as evidence of retaliation
Jack Birle
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Gov. Ron DeSantis (R-FL) bragged in his recent memoir about how he went after Disney following their denouncement of the Parental Rights in Education bill. Now, the entertainment giant is using that book as evidence in its lawsuit against the governor.
In the lawsuit against DeSantis, lawyers for Disney cited the governor’s book, The Courage to Be Free: Florida’s Blueprint for America’s Revival, five times. They also cited an opinion piece by DeSantis published in the Wall Street Journal.
DISNEY SUES DESANTIS OVER ALLEGED ‘CAMPAIGN TO WEAPONIZE GOVERNMENT POWER’ AGAINST COMPANY
Disney alleges in the lawsuit that DeSantis, the Central Florida Tourism Oversight District board, and other state officials pursued a “relentless campaign to weaponize government power against Disney in retaliation for expressing a political viewpoint unpopular with certain State officials.”
The lawsuit alleges the state violated Disney’s First Amendment right to speech, the contract and takings clauses in the U.S. Constitution, and the company’s 14th Amendment right to due process.
The lawsuit first mentions excerpts from DeSantis’s book when discussing how the governor reacted to Disney’s statement on the Parental Rights in Education bill. Disney vowed to make it their goal for the “law to be repealed by the legislature or struck down in the courts.”
“Governor DeSantis’s memoir attacked Disney’s speech and petitioning activity for expressing the wrong viewpoint. ‘In promising to work to repeal the bill,’ he asserted, ‘the company was pledging a frontal assault on a duly enacted law of the State of Florida.’ As a consequence of its disfavored speech and petitioning, he declared, ‘[t]hings got worse for Disney,'” the filing said, citing DeSantis’s book.
The memoir is next cited when Disney alleges DeSantis was “orchestrating” the action to strip Disney of its special taxing district behind closed doors. The lawsuit quotes lines where DeSantis says that he wanted an “element of surprise” with the action.
The next quotes from the book appear in the filing when Disney alleges DeSantis targeted the company’s district specifically with legislation in 2022 — as opposed to claims at the time that legislation was intended to target various special districts.
“These rationales did not make sense. Only six independent special districts that were created before 1968 had not been reconstituted in the intervening years. Of those, RCID was the only district closely connected to a specific corporation. And, in Governor DeSantis’s memoir, he admitted that he ‘found’ that there was this ‘handful of other districts’ that ‘also deserved scrutiny’ only after his ‘staff worked with the legislative staff in the House’ to target Disney,” the lawsuit alleges.
When discussing DeSantis’s reaction to the 2022 legislation which eliminated Disney’s Reedy Creek Improvement District, they mention how he celebrates the legislation for its impact on Disney after it had spoken out against the Parental Rights in Education bill.
“Governor DeSantis’s memoir describes the attack on Disney with pride: ‘Nobody saw it coming, and Disney did not have enough time to put its army of high-powered lobbyists to work to try to derail the bill. That the Legislature agreed to take it up would have been unthinkable just a few months before. Disney had clearly crossed a line in its support of indoctrinating very young schoolchildren in woke gender identity politics,’” the filing said.
The lawsuit also includes excerpts from DeSantis’s Wall Street Journal op-ed, in which DeSantis says the 2023 legislation restructuring the Central Florida district encompassing the Walt Disney World Resort was connected to Disney’s opposition to the Parental Rights in Education bill, HB 1557.
Lawyers for Disney also cite DeSantis’s book for a fifth time, alleging he said Disney’s speech on the Parental Rights in Education bill was the motivation for action on Disney’s Central Florida district.
“Indeed, Governor DeSantis has reaffirmed, again and again, that the State campaign to punish Disney for its speech about House Bill 1557 has been a coordinated and deliberate one from the start. Disney’s commentary on House Bill 1557 was, he claimed, a ‘declaration of war’ and ‘a textbook example of when a corporation should stay out of politics,’” the lawsuit said.
DeSantis’s office called the lawsuit “yet another unfortunate example of their hope to undermine the will of the Florida voters.” It added that it was “unaware of any legal right” for a company to hold on to “special privileges.”
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“We are unaware of any legal right that a company has to operate its own government or maintain special privileges not held by other businesses in the state,” Taryn Fenske, communications director for the governor, said in a statement to the Washington Examiner. “This lawsuit is yet another unfortunate example of their hope to undermine the will of the Florida voters and operate outside the bounds of the law.”
Disney is seeking to have the two laws restructuring the former Reedy Creek Improvement District declared as “unlawful and unenforceable.”