The firestorm ignited by Walt Disney Co.’s lawsuit against Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis and other state officials offers further evidence, if any is needed, that our democracy remains deep in its silly season. Disney’s legal claims are straightforward, and most of them seem strong. The politics, however, are utterly inside out.
We need not linger over the facts. Angry about what he sees as Disney’s endorsement of “woke” ideology, the governor has persuaded the legislature to dissolve the Reedy Creek Improvement District, which in its roughly six decades of existence has enabled Disney World to act, in effect, as a self-governing enclave. In its place, the state has created a new entity — whose members are appointed by the governor.
Stripped of a few dozen pages of highly quotable verbiage, Disney’s complaint against DeSantis boils down to breach of contract. In particular, the company claims that certain development agreements into which it entered with the RCID (as it’s known) can’t be abrogated by its newly created successor, the Central Florida Tourism Oversight District.
This is a simple, uncomplicated legal argument. Even the federal government is usually expected to abide by its contracts. In Florida too — although there exist a handful of exceptions — the state’s courts generally treat development agreements between private corporations and local governments as legally enforceable contracts. Thus all that’s necessary is for the Florida courts to decide whether the Oversight District’s actions breached the agreement with Disney, and, if the answer is yes, whether the state has any defense — the sort of dispute that lawyers follow with interest but is hardly worthy of public attention.
I doubt that the courts will ever adjudicate the breach of contract claim.