A.G. Gancarski
Florida’s Lieutenant Governor is hailing Gov. Ron DeSantis for “good public policy” in the ongoing battle with the Walt Disney Company.
Jeanette Nuñez defended the ongoing conflict to Newsmax viewers Friday as a justified response to the company’s decision to “wade into politics” in its objection to Parental Rights in Education legislation last year.
“I think it’s good public policy,” Nuñez said, rejecting a characterization of the Governor’s position as “sniping.”
“We’re not going to stand around and let one corporation have unique privileges, special privileges that do not extend to other corporations. And so not only did they wade into politics because of their woke agenda because of their woke CEO that wants to control Florida from California. The Governor took real action,” the LG contended.
Indeed, DeSantis took “real action” as recently as Friday, signing into law monorail inspections for the Central Florida theme park.
“And what we’re seeing is that we have a new board, their board at the 11th hour under very, very interesting circumstances, decided to try to upend what the legislature had passed,” Nuñez added.
The circumstances are so interesting that they are leading to competing lawsuits in separate venues.
The Governor signed legislation changing Disney’s special district in the wake of the company opposing 2022’s Parental Rights in Education law, leading to Disney filing a federal lawsuit against DeSantis and other state parties for a “targeted campaign of government retaliation.”
Meanwhile, DeSantis signed legislation revoking deals Disney made before the Reedy Creek Improvement District dissolved.
The state-appointed Central Florida Tourism Oversight Board that replaced Reedy Creek plans to countersue Disney in state court, where a favorable hearing is likely.
“We’re not going to stand for a corporation trying to flex their muscle no matter how big they are, no matter how many people they employ, they cannot use that as a bargaining tool to be able to say that they should have these special rights, these special privileges,” the LG added.
“So we’re always going to do what’s right for the people of Florida. We’re always going to protect the interest, not just of a corporation in particular. We feel that there should be a level playing field and we want all of our corporations to do the right thing. But they don’t have the right to upend the law.”
Disney sees the matter differently.
CEO Bob Iger said the state’s position “is about one thing and one thing only, and that’s retaliating against us for taking a position about pending legislation. This is not about special privileges or a level playing field or Disney in any way using its leverage around the state of Florida.”
Disney is planning to invest $17 billion in Florida over the next decade, Iger said, which led him to ask one question: “Does the state want us to invest more, employ more people and pay more taxes or not?”
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Gabrielle Russon contributed reporting.
3 comments
Billy the Bamboozler
May 13, 2023 at 3:51 pm
These hogs are deranged and operate under false beliefs about the economy and even the origins of the universe. Florida is full of these maniacs and God knows what grift made them so much money.. put them in these positions. Families were probably already rich and rolling around in the pig pen with other hogs has polluted the mind with bad philosophy and political ideology.
Dont Say FLA
May 15, 2023 at 2:00 pm
Ron graduated from Yarvard and Hale. Obviously he is in fact a spoiled rich kid, just like that guy Osama bin Laden was too. Spoiled rich kids are the dang worst.
Dont Say FLA
May 15, 2023 at 1:58 pm
It IS good publicity for the Donald Duch Trump campaign and the Mickey Nikki Haley campaign. Too bad it comes at the expense of Florida’s taxpayers. Why aren’t people in Florida concerned about Ron wasting tax money on his personal vendetta nonsense?
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