Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis on Thursday reacted to a lawsuit brought against him by Disney, describing it as a political move that lacks merit, while accusing the company of lacking accountability and transparency.
DeSantis made the remarks during a press conference in Israel, where he faced questions on the lawsuit, the latest move by Disney in a long-running dispute over DeSantis’s efforts to revoke the company’s special legal and economic privileges.
“I don’t think the suit has merit, I think it’s political,” DeSantis told reporters in Jerusalem.
Under DeSantis, Florida has passed legislation that ended special conditions that Disney enjoyed for decades in how it administered the district where Disney World is located, which basically gave the company near total operational autonomy.
Speaking to reporters in Jerusalem, DeSantis said that the special privileges that had been granted to Disney in how it administered the special district where Disney World is located was “not good for the state of Florida.”
“They had no transparency, no accountability, none of that, and that arrangement was not good for the state of Florida,” DeSantis said.
“We did not think that that should continue, so we now have brought accountability,” he added.
Disney did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
Lawsuit Details
Disney has accused the Florida state government of an unlawful crackdown for expressing an opinion that it says should be protected under free speech laws.“At the Governor’s bidding, the State’s oversight board has purported to ‘void’ publicly noticed and duly agreed development contracts, which had laid the foundation for billions of Disney’s investment dollars and thousands of jobs,” the complaint reads. It also claims that the move was “patently retaliatory, patently anti-business, and patently unconstitutional.”
The complaint states that DeSantis doesn’t plan to stop there, noting that his team “also planned ’to look at things like taxes on the hotels,‘ ’tolls on the roads,’ ‘developing some of the property that the district owns with more amusement parks,’ and even putting a ’state prison‘ next to Disney World.’”
The complaint quotes DeSantis as saying, “Who knows, I just think the possibilities are endless.”
DeSantis’s Communications Director Taryn Fenske told The Epoch Times in a statement, “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.”
Disney Calls for Repeal
The long-running controversy stems from Disney’s full-throated opposition to a law dubbed by its opponents as the “Don’t Say Gay” bill.“Florida’s HB 1557, also known as the ‘Don’t Say Gay’ bill, should never have passed and should never have been signed into law,” the statement reads.
Disney stated at the time that it was the company’s goal “for this law to be repealed by the legislature or struck down in the courts.”
Supporters of the legislation have argued that it gives parents more power to decide how and when topics relating to LGBT issues can be introduced to their children. It also gives parents the opportunity to sue school districts for violating the rules set out in the legislation.
On the day he signed the bill into law, DeSantis said that “parents have every right to be informed about services offered to their child at school and should be protected from schools using classroom instruction to sexualize their kids as young as 5 years old.”
Disney’s declaration of opposition to the bill prompted some parent groups to call for boycotts of the company’s products, movies, theme parks, and shows.
The escalation continued until Disney finally filed its lawsuit.
