Disney Sues Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis Over Disney World “Retaliation” & Free Speech
The war between the Walt Disney Company and Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis just opened up a whole new front in the courts.
After months of battling with the likely GOP presidential contender and his personally appointed board over jurisdiction and control of Orlando-based Walt Disney World and its now-besieged special district status, the House of Mouse today took the white gloves off and sued the governor in federal court.
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“Disney regrets that it has come to this,” the company said in its complaint (read it here). “But having exhausted efforts to seek a resolution, the company is left with no choice but to file this lawsuit to protect its cast members, guests, and local development partners from a relentless campaign to weaponize government power against Disney in retaliation for expressing a political viewpoint unpopular with certain state officials.”
In a showdown that has been brewing and boiling as DeSantis’ presidential ambitions have grown, the Bob Iger-run media giant claims that the Sunshine State governor has enacted a policy of “retaliation” against Disney because of its opposition to one of his priorities, a parental rights bill known as the “Don’t Say Gay” law.
Wednesday’s legal action followed votes by the DeSantis-picked board to void agreements the previous Disney World jurisdiction board enacted in its last days over who would hold the reins on the sprawling theme park’s 56-year-old tax-district status.
The governor has relentlessly attacked the company as a “woke” corporation and said this month that the Florida government is exploring a series of possible actions against it, including increasing oversight of ride safety, boosting assessment valuations of its properties and even slapping tolls on the roads leading into its resorts. He even suggested that a state prison could be built nearby the theme parks.
RELATED: A New Prison Near Walt Disney World? Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis Turns Up The Heat On Reedy Creek
The lawsuit is rooted in DeSantis’ efforts to strip the company of control of the Reedy Creek Improvement District, the entity established in 1967 that allowed the company to self-govern its sprawling Florida property. The district has oversight over such things as infrastructure, roads and development and also has powers of taxation and the ability to take on bond debt.
Last year, after Disney under then-CEO Bob Chapek came out against the DeSantis-backed parental rights bill, the governor moved to dissolve the special district. But surrounding counties raised alarms that it would leave them left to pay around $1 billion in the district debt. DeSantis then led an effort earlier this year to instead retain the district but place it under state control, with the governor having the power to appoint its members and confirmed by the state Senate.
Yet as the state Legislature moved in February toward passage of that DeSantis-backed Reedy Creek bill, the district’s board, still under Disney’s control, approved a development agreement with Walt Disney World. Those agreements ensure that the company would retain control over the development of its own property and the land surrounding it, no matter that DeSantis-appointees were about to take charge of the district board.
The Disney development agreement were approved in open meetings albeit little media coverage, and drew attention only in the past month, when DeSantis-selected board members said that they had discovered that their authority was greatly constrained. DeSantis’ critics, including GOP rival Donald Trump, said that the governor had gotten outfoxed by savvy Disney.
The governor then vowed that the board and the state Legislature would move to invalidate Disney’s development agreement. In its new lawsuit, the company refers to the efforts to repeal the development agreement as a legislative declaration.
Disney said in its lawsuit that “a targeted campaign of government retaliation — orchestrated at every step by Governor DeSantis as punishment for Disney’s protected speech — now threatens Disney’s business operations, jeopardizes its economic future in the region, and violates its constitutional rights.”
It adds: “Because the Legislative Declaration retaliates against Disney for its protected speech, Disney is entitled to a declaratory judgment that the Legislative Declaration is unconstitutional and an order enjoining Defendants from enforcing it.”
In a statement, DeSantis’ communications director, Taryn Fenske, said, “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.”
Fenske added, “This lawsuit us 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 represented in the lawsuit by Daniel Petrocelli and Jonathan Hacker of O’Melveny & Myers.
In claiming retaliation, Disney’s lawsuit chronicles DeSantis’ statements as he moved to dissolve the special district and later take control of it.
“Governor DeSantis has let no doubt be harbored as to the impetus for his punishment. He wrote in an article to promote his book, ‘When corporations try to use their economic power to advance a woke agenda, they become political, and not merely economic, actors. … Leaders must stand up and fight back when big corporations make the mistake, as Disney did, of using their economic might to advance apolitical agenda.'”
The lawsuit also references DeSantis’ quote in February, as it became clear that the state would take control of Reedy Creek.
“There’s a new sheriff in town and that’s just the way it’s going to be,” he said, apparently unaware of the Disney development agreement.
The company also pushed back on DeSantis’ claim that Disney was trying to pull a fast one on him. “None of this was true. As explained, these Contracts followed public notice—in the Orlando Sentinel, no less—and public hearings. But, despite the facts, the political story was set, and the retaliation only got worse,” the lawsuit stated.
Disney said that the development agreement is based on a comprehensive plan that got the sign off from the governor’s staff last year. The lawsuit claims violations of the First Amendment, as well as the Constitution’s contracts clause, the Fifth Amendment’s takings clause, and the Fourteenth Amendment’s due process clause.
Disney is asking the court to declare that the effort to void the development agreement is “unlawful and enforceable.” The company also wants a declaration that the state legislature’s bills to dissolve Reedy Creek and then to take control of it were “unlawful and unenforceable” because “they were enacted in retaliation for Disney’s political speech in violation of the First Amendment.”
It also named as defendants the board members of Reedy Creek, renamed the Central Florida Tourism Oversight District.
DeSantis’ moves have drawn criticism from Trump and other Republicans, including current and potential rivals. Nikki Haley told Fox News that “if Disney would like to move its hundreds of thousands of jobs to South Carolina, and bring the billions of dollars with them, I will be happy to meet them and introduce them to the governor and the legislature that would welcome it.” Mike Pence and Chris Christie also have been critical of DeSantis’ targeting of the company.
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