Analysis | Disney vs. DeSantis: Why the Florida governor may get caught in his own mousetrap

There’s a dark cloud hovering over Walt Disney World, the self-styled Most Magical Place on Earth.

Under Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis, a potential candidate for the Republican Party’s presidential nomination, the treatment that the world-famous theme park and driver of the state’s economic activity has received is casting an authoritarian gloom over the Sunshine State.

That’s not the only trouble involving DeSantis, who has cast himself and his state as the protector and fortress of personal freedoms in the United States.

The college baseball star, who grew up next to the Toronto Blue Jays’ spring training stadium in Dunedin, was actually married at the Disney resort in 2009. But a Walt Disney Corp. lawsuit seeking to put an end to DeSantis’s “targeted campaign of government retaliation” against the company must surely be seen as a divorce.

The battle DeSantis is waging is part of a clear political plan to cast himself as a crusading culture warrior capable of challenging Donald Trump’s bid to lead the Republican Party in the 2024 election. But the feud with Disney could backfire if it ends up alienating more moderate, pro-business members of the party.

The origins of DeSantis’s dispute with the company go back a year, to the passage of what’s known as the “Don’t-Say-Gay” law, a bill that bans discussion of sexual orientation and gender identity outright before the third grade and permits it only in “age-appropriate or developmentally appropriate” terms for older students.

Disney was initially a reluctant voice of dissent. It only spoke out publicly after facing the criticisms of some of the 75,000 Florida residents it employs.

But DeSantis took particular umbrage, and responded with legislation to revoke the special status that has allowed Disney to operate essentially as a municipal government since 1967, giving it tax benefits and powers over development.

Between then and now, DeSantis was re-elected to a second term last November, becoming the rare resounding victory in an otherwise disappointing Republican midterm election result. His return as Florida governor instantly marked him as a serious contender to become Trump’s eventual successor.

He has been weighing his chances and polishing his political credentials ever since.

In recent months, he has signed off on initiatives and legislation to permanently outlaw vaccine mandates; to roll up the welcome mat for illegal migrants; to strengthen the rights of gun owners; to prohibit abortion if the fetus has a detectable heartbeat; and to lower the legal threshold needed to sentence an offender to death.

Florida’s Senate passed a bill this month to stop permits from being issued to establishments that admit children to sexually suggestive “adult” performances. It came in response to complaints about a drag queen show last Christmas initially billed as “all ages” but it has had a broader chilling effect in Florida, and led to one group abruptly cancelling its annual Gay Pride parade last weekend and restricting other events to those older than 21.

“With the likelihood that the governor will sign the latest bill into effect this evening,” the group wrote April 19 on its Facebook page, “we will need to be on the side of caution.”

DeSantis has made no attempt to hide the special political grudge he holds toward Disney.

In February, he signed off on the bill to end Disney’s ability to run the territory it occupies like a municipal government — a power it was granted in 1967 — a move DeSantis referred to as “dissolving the Corporate Kingdom.”

As the tussle continued, DeSantis mused about using the power of the state to muscle in on Disney’s magical kingdom, floating the idea of a state park, imposing hotel taxes and road tolls or constructing a prison next door.

“The governor and his allies have made clear they do not care and will not stop,” Disney says in its lawsuit against DeSantis and the state.

Before Disney, it was the Tampa Bay Rays that fell into the governor’s crosshairs.

In response to a May 2022 tweet from the baseball team about the need to prevent gun violence in America, DeSantis vetoed state funding for the team’s new training stadium, saying that he found it “inappropriate to subsidize political activism of a private corporation.”

The same underlying principle applies now. DeSantis has shown himself a vicious adversary of any person or entity expressing political positions that conflict with the ones that he holds, confident in his ability to wield his political powers like a weapon.

But beneath the facade, Disney is a bigger beast than any baseball club, with deeper pockets, a longer history and a solid anchor both in the state of Florida and the American mythology.

The corporation is also not beholden to artificial timelines driven by election cycles. It’s not afraid of this fight, and will be just as content to drag it through the courts as to have a quick and quiet settlement.

While there is undoubtedly a segment of Republican voters that will be energized by the legislative path DeSantis is blazing in Florida, taking on a large and important employer and engine of economic growth makes others nervous.

Florida Sen. Marco Rubio told “Fox and Friends” on Thursday it could be “problematic in the eyes of some people when you start creating the idea … that somehow like if you run crossways with us politically, whoever is in charge, then, you know, you wind up in the crosshairs of the legislature.”

“I do worry,” he continued, “that if this happens too many times, businesses that are thinking about coming to Florida are saying maybe we don’t want to go there because if we get into a firestorm with them politically, they’re going to come after our business again.”

All of this is unfolding as DeSantis tours the world, meeting with government officials and business leaders in what seems like one of the essential last steps before he jumps into the race to challenge U.S. President Joe Biden in 2024.

But while he is away, strange forces are at play.

Trump — criminally indicted and with a rape case against him in the courts — seems to be solidifying his support among Republicans. And Disney — the embodiment of all that is considered good and inoffensive about the United States — is lashing out in defence of a fundamental American value, stated in the pages of its lawsuit.

“In America, the government cannot punish you for speaking your mind.”

Allan Woods is a Montreal-based staff reporter for the Star. He covers global and national affairs. Follow him on Twitter: @WoodsAllan

SHARE: