Haley Blasts DeSantis for Flip-Flopping on Disney, Says Company Has ‘Been Woke for a Long Time’

Former South Carolina Gov. Nikki Haley blasted Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis for flip-flopping on Disney at the GOP debate in Iowa Wednesday, pointing out that he had signed off on massive subsidies and regulatory carveouts for the company before it criticized him on the Parental Rights in Education bill.

Haley and DeSantis were at Drake University in Des Moines Wednesday evening for the final debate before the Iowa caucuses next Monday, moderated by CNN anchors Jake Tapper and Dana Bash.

As a refresher on how DeSantis’ war with Disney began, the former Disney CEO publicly criticized the Parental Rights in Education bill (dubbed the “Don’t Say Gay” bill by many of its critics) after DeSantis signed it. Many other companies issued far harsher criticism and Disney didn’t actually do anything about the bill after that press release, but it was enough to trigger DeSantis’ ire. He signed a bill in a 2022 special session that revoked Disney’s special taxing district, originally called the Reedy Creek Improvement District (RCID), under which Disney paid extra taxes (roughly $150 million per year) over their regular county property taxes to provide infrastructure and services at a level that government was unable to do.

DeSantis’ original plan flopped because of the fact that dissolving RCID would dump more than a billion dollars of municipal bond debt on Central Florida taxpayers, among other issues. At DeSantis’ urging, the legislature came back with a new bill in 2023 that nibbled away a few of RCID’s powers and largely left it intact, but renamed it the Central Florida Tourism Oversight District (CFTOD) and granted the power to appoint the directors to DeSantis, instead of Disney as the landowner.

Since then, DeSantis has continued to levy threats at Disney, including imposing higher taxes and increased regulations or seizing some of Disney’s land to sell to a competing theme park or even to build a prison. The puppet board members he appointed all came from various conservative activist circles (one notable example is Bridget Ziegler, the wife of the disgraced former Republican Party of Florida chairman), none of them have any theme park management experience and they’ve engaged in a variety of actions that have been criticized as causing deliberate harm to the park and its properties, including slashing the road maintenance budget and even voting to eliminate the $8 million budget for supplemental law enforcement protection (literally “defunding the police”).

By even an objective assessment, the takeover of Disney’s special taxing district was a massive government interference.

When the debate returned from a commercial break, Bash opened with asking about “a big question in the Republican party right now…the role of government and should it use its power to go after businesses and private entities that take actions that don’t align with conservative values?” The CNN anchor directed the question to DeSantis: “Governor DeSantis, you used your powers to take on Disney after it criticized an education bill you signed into law. How does that square with the traditional conservative view that small limited government is best?”

DeSantis answered by focusing on the culture war issues voiced by supporters of the Parental Rights in Education bill, accusing Disney of wanting to “sexualize the curriculum” and “transing kids.”

When it was Haley’s turn to respond, she began by using traditional conservative talking points about limited government.

“Government was intended to secure the rights and freedoms of the people,” she said. “It was never meant to be all things all people. And what we don’t need is government politicizing everything.”

She again directed the audience to her DeSantisLies.com website to correct his attacks on her about gender issues and then brought up DeSantis’ past support for Disney.

“It’s really interesting that Ron talks about Disney, because Disney has been woke for a long time,” said Haley, listing past political positions the company had taken, and “Ron didn’t have any problem with that. As a matter of fact, he gave them the largest corporate subsidies in Florida history. He had a tech exemption, he didn’t give tech exemptions to anybody but Disney.
Yet when they criticized him he got thin-skinned and suddenly started fighting back.”

“We don’t need government fighting against our private industries, she concluded. “We are not woke in south Carolina. I will always invite businesses to come to South Carolina. But the one thing you don’t do, is government doesn’t bully our businesses and that can’t happen and Ron is determined, anybody that offends him, he goes after them.”

Haley is correct about DeSantis previously supporting hundreds of millions of dollars worth of subsidies and incentives for Disney, prior to the spat over the Parental Rights in Education bill. The “tech exemption” she referenced was a 2021 social media regulation bill that imposed a $250,000 fine on tech companies if they deplatformed a statewide political candidate, but said it would not apply to any “company that owns and operates a theme park or entertainment complex” in the state — a very obvious exemption that was intended to create a carve out for Disney.

Even this past year, well into DeSantis’ ongoing spat with the House of Mouse, the governor signed a voucher bill that has been heavily criticized for allowing reimbursements for purchases that include big-screen TVs, paddleboards, trampolines — and tickets to Walt Disney World.

Watch above via CNN.