DeSantis abolished DEI programs on Tuesday from Walt Disney special district, which is now controlled by appointees of Florida governor for Disney. The action has echoes of the Governor DeSantis’s DEI agenda curtailing the same programs in the state’s higher education institutions.
Florida governor vs Disney
The Central Florida Tourism Oversight District said in a statement that its diversity, equity and inclusion (DEI) committee would be eliminated, as would any job duties connected to it. As per the Florida Disney bill, also axed were initiatives left over from when the Walt Disney special district was controlled by Disney supporters, which awarded contracts based on goals of achieving racial or gender parity.
Florida Disney bill
As per Disney special district’s new administrator Glenton Gilzean, who is African American and a former head of the Central Florida Urban League, called such initiatives “illegal and simply un-American.” Gilzean has been a fellow or member at two conservative institutions, the James Madison Institute and the American Enterprise Institute Leadership Network, as well as a DeSantis appointee to the Florida Commission on Ethics.
“Our district will no longer participate in any attempt to divide us by race or advance the notion that we are not created equal,” Gilzean said in a statement. “As the former head of the Central Florida Urban League, a civil rights organization, I can say definitively that our community thrives only when we work together despite our differences.”
An email was sent seeking comment from Disney World on Florida Disney bill.
Last spring, DeSantis, who is running for the GOP presidential nomination, signed into law a measure that blocks public colleges from using federal or state funding on diversity programs.
DeSantis also has championed Florida’s so-called “Stop WOKE” law, which bars businesses, colleges and K-12 schools from giving training on certain racial concepts, such as the theory that people of a particular race are inherently racist, privileged or oppressed. A federal judge last November blocked the law’s enforcement in colleges, universities and businesses, calling it “positively dystopian.”
Previous Florida governor created Disney special district
The creation of the Disney special district, then known as the Reedy Creek Improvement District, was instrumental in Disney’s decision to build a theme park resort near Orlando in the 1960s. Having a separate government by Florida governor allowing Disney the company to provide zoning, fire protection, utilities and infrastructure services on its sprawling property. The Disney special district was controlled by Disney supporters for more than five decades.
Feud between Florida governor and Disney
The DeSantis appointees took control of the renamed district earlier this year following a yearlong feud between Disney special district and DeSantis. The fight began last year after Disney, beset by significant pressure internally and externally, publicly opposed a state law banning classroom lessons on sexual orientation and gender identity in early grades, a policy critics call “Don’t Say Gay.”
As punishment, DeSantis passed a Florida Disney bill and took over the Disney special district through legislation passed by Republican lawmakers and appointed a new board of supervisors to oversee municipal services for the sprawling theme parks and hotels. For DeSantis DEI, Disney sued him and his five board appointees in federal court, claiming the Florida governor violated the company’s free speech rights by taking the retaliatory action.
Before the new board came in, Disney made agreements with previous oversight board members who were Disney supporters that stripped the new supervisors of their authority over design and development. The DeSantis-appointed members of the governing district have sued Disney in state court in a second lawsuit stemming from the district’s takeover, seeking to invalidate those agreements.
