Topline
Disney promised Monday to support efforts to strike down Florida’s Parental Rights in Education Act—known by critics as the “Don’t Say Gay” bill—after Gov. Ron DeSantis (R) signed it into law, saying the law “should never” have been enacted after the company drew widespread criticism for not doing more to oppose it before the bill was passed.
Disney employee Tiffany Cooper holds a sign to protest the company’s stance on LGBTQ issues in … [+]
Key Facts
Disney said in a statement that its “goal as a company is for this law to be repealed by the legislature or struck down in the courts” and the company is “committed to supporting” organizations working to achieve that.
HB 1557 “should never have passed and should never have been signed into law,” the company, whose Florida Walt Disney World resort is the country’s largest single-site employer, said.
The statement came shortly after after DeSantis signed HB 1557, which prohibits classroom instruction related to “sexual orientation or gender identity” up until the third grade, and restricts it in higher grades if it’s “in a manner that is not age appropriate or developmentally appropriate.”
Disney worked behind the scenes to amend the bill’s language—and was unsuccessful—but was criticized for not doing more to publicly oppose the bill before it passed, and while Disney CEO Bob Chapek said after the bill passed he would meet with DeSantis in an effort to get him to veto it, DeSantis’ office said Disney’s outreach did not affect the governor’s support for the bill.
DeSantis has slammed Disney as being too “woke” for its last-minute opposition to HB 1557 and criticized it and other companies that are against the legislation Monday, saying before signing the bill he doesn’t “care what big corporations say…I’m not backing down.”
Crucial Quote
“We are dedicated to standing up for the rights and safety of LGBTQ+ members of the Disney family, as well as the LGBTQ+ community in Florida and across the country,” Disney said in its statement.
What to Watch for:
Legal challenges to be filed against HB 1557, as the Human Rights Campaign and Equality Florida said in statements Monday they intend to challenge the law in court and try to repeal it in the legislature. The HRC has previously been critical of Disney’s response to HB 1557 and announced it wouldn’t accept any donations from the company until it took “meaningful action” against the legislation, but after Disney stepped up its opposition of the bill, the HRC now says it’s in touch with the company on “how Disney can take meaningful action to support its employees and speak out against anti-LGBTQ+ legislation”—which would likely include supporting the HRC’s efforts to challenge HB 1557 in court.
Key Background
Disney and its CEO Bob Chapek have come under widespread criticism for the company’s response to HB 1557, given the company’s outsized economic influence in Florida. Before the bill passed the state legislature, Chapek said the company would not publicly speak out against it and instead preferred to champion LGBTQ rights through its entertainment content. (Pixar employees later noted in a letter that Disney has actually asked the animation studio to cut out “nearly every moment of overtly gay affection” it put into its films.) That response drew widespread criticism and caused the company to reverse course, with Chapek ultimately speaking out against the bill at a shareholder meeting—right after it had already passed the state legislature—and then pausing the companies’ political donations in Florida entirely. While polling suggests Disney fans have been more mixed on the company’s response, Disney employees have been heavily critical of the company’s handling of the issue, with multiple divisions within Disney openly opposing the company’s response and workers staging walkouts in protest.
Further Reading
Florida Gov. DeSantis Signs ‘Don’t Say Gay’ Bill Into Law Despite Controversy (Forbes)
Disney Fans Want Companies To Oppose ‘Don’t Say Gay’ Bill—But Not Take Drastic Measures, Poll Finds (Forbes)
Source: https://www.forbes.com/sites/alisondurkee/2022/03/28/disney-says-striking-down-dont-say-gay-law-is-companys-goal-after-desantis-signs-bill/