Thank God Disney is finally doing what it should have done months ago:
Walt Disney Co. sued Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis after a new board he named to oversee the district housing the company’s Orlando-area theme parks declared null and void agreements Disney struck in February.
The lawsuit accuses Mr. DeSantis of conducting a “targeted campaign of government retaliation” as punishment for the company’s decision to speak out against a law passed last year with the governor’s backing that bars classroom instruction on gender identity and sexual orientation in early elementary-school years.
This is what Disney should have done in the first place. It simply can't be legal for a governor to carry out an obviously personal vendetta using state resources against a specific person or company. It would be one thing if DeSantis had a legitimate policy beef with Disney, but last year, when he started his war, he explicitly said it was nothing of the sort:
DeSantis made clear Friday that the moves, targeting Disney’s self-governing status and a special carve-out in another law, were retribution for the company [speaking out] against Florida’s recently enacted “Parental Rights in Education” bill, branded as “Don’t Say Gay” by opponents.
He specifically took aim at Disney pushing to repeal the law. “You’re a corporation based in Burbank, California, and you’re going to martial your economic might to attack the parents of my state? We view that as a provocation, and we’re going to fight back against that,” DeSantis said during an event at a Hialeah Gardens charter school.
This needs to be firmly slapped down in court. Neither a corporation nor a person should be subject to official state retribution merely for stating an opinion.
The real question is if and when this makes it to the Supreme Court, what pretext will the conservative justices use in this case to say that, in this one instance, corporate speech isn't legally protected free speech?
Because a Mouse is not a person. Corporations are people, my friend, but a Mouse is not a person, therefore Disney is not a person and has no corporate rights.
Clear as quicksand.
I don't know. I'm a republican living in Florida who voted for DeSantis. But, I think he is dead wrong on this issue. Real conservatives don't think government should take punitive actions against private sector companies.
"Real conservatives don't think government should take punitive actions against private sector companies."
Which be---, er, raises the question, who do real conservatives think government should take punitive actions against?
That was clumsy wording on my part, I guess. My point was, government shouldn't go after people of businesses in the private sector for expressing political views.
"Real conservatives"
Yawn.
Get back to me when Republicans support the constitution again. Until then, take your "I'm one of the good ones" and fix your party with it.
If I could, I would. How do you suggest I go about doing that? And I never said, "I'm one of the good ones." I was just saying I hold more traditional republican and conservatives views.
As unpleasant as this may seem to you, you have to put your vote where your mouth is. As in, don't vote for DeSantis again, even if he's running against some "horrible leftist".
I'm not saying you have to vote for the horrible leftist. Vote for the Libertarian or whatever. Or don't vote. Losing is the only thing that will change their minds.
I have done something similar at least once, so I'm eating my own dog food here.
Just for the record, and I have no way of knowing for sure, Atticus has stated he did not vote for Trump.
Correct. I did vote for him in 2016 but not 2020. In 2016 I voted for Rubio in the primary. Would have voted for Jeb but he had already dropped out.
"I'm not saying you have to vote for the horrible leftist. Vote for the Libertarian or whatever."
That is not a good answer, actually. The infantile republicans that "cannot vote for the leftists" are giving the trumpist the chance. If they behaved like adults in 2020 or 2022, then this whole mess would have gone by now.
if they behaved like adults they'd be democrats.
And most of my (very educated) friends and family believe that if democrats behaved like adults they'd be republicans.
oooh, very educated. i'm impressed.
How 'well-educated' is he? Well, after proclaiming he had an English degree, 'Atticus' did not recognize one of Harper Lee's novels as being by ... Harper Lee. Again, this one is claiming not just to be educated, but 'well-educated'. Truly irony is an underappreciated art form.
Scentofviolets: not sure what you’re talking about. I’ve never been confused by who the auther of the Harper Lee novel is. You’re either confusing me with someone else or lying. And, my “well educated” remark was in reference to my friends and family. (Although I do have a masters degree.) I felt it was necessary as many on here think all republicans are undereducated.
'The' Harper Lee novel? Game. Set. Match.
Scentofviolets: I’m considering it one novel because “Go Set A Watchmen” was essentially the first draft of “To Kill A Mockingbird”. After reading it the publisher told her to focus more on the flashbacks of Scout’s childhood so she turned it into TKAM.
Enjoy being your usual bitter self. I sincerely hope you aren’t this miserable in real life and only act this way when you have your veil anonymity.
An adult would not have said that 'they consider' the two to be the same book, nor would they regard saying so a valid defense of ignorance. An adult would have said okay you got me, I didn't know that, it's a fair cop. But then again, adults aren't Slaver apologists and don't generally pretend that White Christian Nationalism is a valid political movement.
Scentofviolets: I'm not sure what it is you think I didn't know.
But anyway, have a good day. Not sure why I engage with you when you're whole purpose here is to be a troll and just make personal attacks.
It's pretty obvious you didn't know that Go Set a Watchmen was written by Harper Lee. Despite your belated assertion to the contrary. Such obvious lies do not become even you, 'Atticus'. Refusing to admit you made a mistake when everyone can see exactly where you made a mistke doesn't make you look strong. It makes you look weak. But don't let me tell you how to conduct yourself in an adult fashion.
Scentofviolets: you are truly an idiot. Go troll somewhere else. And please work on your reading comprehension. Not sure why you always try (and fail) to insinuate I’m lying or ignorant. I didn’t say anything that should make you think I didn’t know who wrote Go Set A Watchmen. On the contrary, I had it preordered on Amazon months before it was released. But nothing I say matters, right? You’ll continue to be a troll and make personal attacks that have no relevance to the topic at hand. Maybe one day you will grow up.
Atticus, most Democrats behave like you. We're not out doing whatever it is you think Democrats are doing. We just like you.
Charlie Christ was no leftist and so that is not even excuse. How many millions of Florida taxpayer dollars will Desantis spend on his Prez election campaign? As much as he wants because no 'good Republican' seems to have the stones to stop him.
I was actually considering voting for Crist. Then one day I saw him on CNN talking about abortion. He said a bunch of “white men” shouldn’t have any say in it. I was done with him after that.
Gotta have priorities. White nationalism is a key priority for many, you arent alone.
I'm certainly not going to vote for someone that thinks white people need to take a backseat because of their race. If that's what you mean, you are correct that is a priority.
you think yourself holding more traditional republican and conservative views and you voted for desantis? after seeing him action for four years? shame on you.
I agree some things he does and disagree with with others. A lot of the more extreme things have taken place since he won reelection.
And it's a choice between two people. It's not likely you're going to agree with everything either candidate does and says. You just have to pick the one you agree with more.
The activist Left commentator fraction here are of course never satisfied with anything other than sack-and-ashes conversion, even for centre Left.
To start with, you could leave the party of right-wing extremism (the modern GOP) and joint the conservative party (the Democratic Party).
I don’t agree with very bunch the Democratic Party stands for.
There’s actually the seed of a good discussion here, although probably a more complicated one than the internet can handle. Most of us probably have Republican acquaintances who quickly assure us that they’re not like *those* Republicans— the rubes, the bigots, the louts, the bullies, the untraveled and poorly-educated, etc. Except on Election Day, of course. As far as I can tell, they seem to consider it a parallel to Democrats’ tent holding minorities and poor people… just an unfortunate and sometimes embarrassing alliance, but not necessarily a reflection of individual character (aside from the bigotry that informs that assumption, of course). I’m not even sure how to unpack it, but I also won’t take any responsibility for what the GOP has become— I’m a Democrat and my job is to defeat the opposing party, not reform it. It’s on them, not me. I have no idea how it can be done, other than a string of crushing defeats that so far my side can’t deliver, but that’s where we are right now.
I mostly agree with you until you said, "I’m a Democrat and my job is to defeat the opposing party...".
Is that how you feel? Why do you feel it's your job to defeat the opposing party? I've never once in my life felt that way. I always thought my "job" (in so much that it is a job, since I'm not a candidate nor employed in any political capacity) is to vote for candidates I think will make our country/state/city better. If you're a member of a political party that gives an indicator as to what your desired outcome is and the best means to achieve those goals. It doesn't induct you into some blood feud. If anything, my "job" is to find common ground among constituents, not to "defeat" half of them.
Atticus Adultman makes a very adult argument: "You didn't say your words right!", he cries adultly.
TLDR: Deliberately misconstuing what people have said is _not_ adult behaviour. Nor is refusing to admit you're wrong in the face of all evidence.
Obviously I think Democratic policies are superior to Republican ones, and therefore I want Democrats to win— meaning to defeat their opponents— enough to implement said policies. Since “moderate” or reasonable Republicans clearly aren’t in charge of their party, maybe repeated electoral defeats might work in their favor over the long term. But no, I’m not inclined to seek common ground at this point in my life, because my personal experiences suggest that conservatives feel entitled to dictate terms I find unacceptable. I don’t think as highly of them as they assume they deserve.
Is there anything else that Republicans do besides retribution these days? Other than tax breaks for multi-millionaires? Everything else is grievance and retribution. What good things do you think Republicans do anymore?
Not much, unfortunately. But that doesn't mean I agree with liberals.
Another “I don’t agree with his Bart killing philosophy but I do agree with his Selma killing philosophy… well he framed me for armed robbery but I need that upper class tax cut” principled voter. Must be nice to not care how your vote impacts anyone or anything else. If/when this democracy collapses, I can’t wait to be gathered in a mass worship event of whomever our Dear Leader For Life turns out to be, and hear whispers of “yeah this sucks but I just couldn’t bring myself to ever vote for a Democrat!”
https://comb.io/weLOkA
I would say that anyone who legitimately values freedom and hates authoritarianism would agree with this statement. Even the current Supreme Court would likely rule 8 to 1 against Meatball Ron on this.
+1
This Supreme Court will never split 8-1 on anything, because G_d always speaks simultaneously to Justices Thomas and Alito.
Actually, my guess is that the corrupt SCOTUS majority will take the easier and opposite tack: they'll rule that everything done by the Gauleiter of Florida and his pet legislature was merely in the service of ordinary state policy and had absolutely no connection to any opinion that might have been expresses by Disney. Does this fly in the face of a record that will clearly and obviously demonstrate the opposite? Sure. Does SCOTUS care? Not in the least; they are utterly shameless and have not the smallest qualm in obviously lying about the clear facts of the case. (One notorious example: in ruling for the praying high school football coach last year, Gorsuch repeatedly lied by stating that the school district was attempting to prevent the coach from engaging in quiet prayer while students were otherwise engaged when the record clearly showed that he was (very intentionally) leading noisy and ostentatious prayer services with students at midfield.}
This. I fully expect half or more of SCOTUS to simply lie about the facts in the case. They already determined that, despite hundreds of examples of Trump and his minions saying “we gotta get rid of all the Muslims,” it was A-OK to ban all people from Muslim countries. They’ll do something similar here: despite dozens of examples of DeSantis and his minions saying “we gotta punish Disney” they’ll say these moves simply target all special tax districts spanning 2 counties (of which there is only 1 in Florida) and thus there was no animus specifically against Disney.
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The Christain Taliban majority of SCOTUS will find a way to negate Disney's 1st Amendment rights. Afterall, hypocrisy is their singular superpower.
+1
The Verge, which is open to anyone to read, has the rundown and embedded PDF of the lawsuit.
DeSantis' house of cards appears to be collapsing. Perhaps Florida will actually be a purple state in 2024, thanks to the overreach all over the state and the Constitution.
Would be nice but the right just views court defeats as more evidence that THEY are being unfairly treated.
Keep in mind that in 2018 DeSantis won by only about 30,000 votes against a young Black liberal. In Florida electoral terms that is essentially a coin flip. FL voted for Obama twice before voting for Trump twice. The ultra right wing nature of our current government does not mean we are not still a very closely divided state.
Sadly, 1000 people per day move to Florida. Most of them are geriatric Republicans fleeing income taxes. And the state democratic party is a hot mess (Andrew Gillum was a known drug abuser, but they nominated him anyway). So Desantis is going to have to go a lot lower before the Dems in Florida can do anything about him. Or the home insurance industry collapses while he is off playing Prez candidate, that might do it.
Ron DeSantis Heritage Foundation speech (April 21, 2023)
“We can win elections, we can say the right things, we can even do the right things. [But] if the left can just impose its agenda through corporations or other private means and we don't do anything about it then we are going to be losing. What they are trying to do an end run around our constitutional system. They know these policies like the war on fossil fuels and domestic energy, war on the second amendment and other types of individual rights. They know that that would not work at the ballot box, so they can just do an end run around that process, engage in this to try to change policy or change culture, without ever being held accountable, they are going to take that opportunity to do it, but that is going to change our country for the worse, and so I just think as a conservative - it's not conservative to just simply defer to every corporation in America. That's being a corporatist.”
IN OTHER WORDS:
Advocating cultural (and other) change within the private realm is evading our constitutional system. Agendas to change policy or culture must only be enacted by the state. Any other means, including activities by corporations, should be challenged (“held accountable”) by using state power.
You can't gerrymander the market or social networks the way you can gerrymander a legislature, after all!
Bottom line, the First Amendment claim is going to lose. It's virtually impossible to win a retaliation claim for a legislative act. Add to that the fact that most of the judges on the 11th Circuit are Trump appointees, this thing is facing really long odds.
Most cases are difficult to win because it is usually difficult to establish retaliation as a motive for such legislation. There's some pretty open motives in this case, as KD quotes above. DeSantis' statement is far from the only one made in that vein.
No, that's the obstacle to winning a retaliation claim for administrative or executive action. Retaliation via legislation is different. Under U.S. v O'Brien, the courts only ask if a statute is facially constitutional. If it is, the existence of an illicit legislative motive is irrelevant.
You're contradicting yourself; you've gone from 'virutally impossible' to 'impossible'. Perhaps you should clarify (ISTR that you're in my troll file already, but I'm to lazy to open it and make sure.)
@ath7161
It's not just "retaliation via legislation," as outlined in the Disney suit. There are other actions the DeSantis administration has taken against Disney.
In any case, the Disney lawyers claim to have the law on their side.
Not a lawyer, don't claim to be an expert, but I think the suit is an extraordinary action for a major corporation to take against a state government. Disney wouldn't be filing the suit without knowing what they are doing. They will have legal resources the state cannot match, and with many billions of dollars at stake, they are no doubt in it to win it. I wouldn't bet against them.
One of the basic truths of litigation in the USA is that when one side has an overwhelming advantage in attorneys--number, skills, budget--then the other side better wave a white flag quickly or they will be sunk to the bottom of the deep sea of the courts.
The US Government runs into this problem all the time when they have to deal with big corporations. I wonder if Governor DeSantis has considered the uneven matchup of Florida's lawyers against Disney's.
i don't know that desantis really cares. whether you think it's smart or not, he wants this fight with disney, and it probably doesn't matter if in the end he loses and costs the state of florida a huge amount of money. by then, the primary and general elections will be over.
That ought to be "marshal", not "martial". Not to be confused with the surname "Marshall."
Also, you go, Disney! Finally, an entity big enough to give DeSantis a swift kick.
Seems like a great Freudian spelling error to me …
Corporations are property, not people. They are not endowed with any constitutional rights. Contrary Supreme Court decisions (like so many Supreme Court decisions) are obscene power-grabs on behalf of the wealthy that lack historical basis. Hopefully DeSantis loses and his loss encourages the Republicans to rethink their position on this issue.
Perhaps I’ve gotten the sense wrong, but if you want it asserted corporations don’t have constitutional rights, you want Disney to lose this case rather than DeSantis.
I would not mind if the Supreme Court ruled against Disney in a hypothetical SCOTUS review of this case as long as they ALSO overruled Citizen's United, which I understand is based on a similar principle...
I have no hope that DeSantis will win on my preferred grounds (i.e. Corporations have no constitutional rights). So I would rather he lose on those grounds (e.g., his actions infringed the free speech rights of a corporation). So that conservatives can begin to understand the monster that they have created. Because I want Citizen's United dead. And Burwell v. Hobby Lobby.
No, because this isn't restricting speech - it's targeting the company for negative consequences specifically for its execs' speech.
Corporations are legal persons. A concept that has existed for centuries. The fact that Lefties in the past years have an issue with this is from superficial reaction. It is not a problem - otherwise entities like NAACP etc, NGOs, also legal persons, would have no standing.
Of course your hope regarding the Gov of Florida is weak mindedly in complete contradiction of your hopes.
Also, newspapers would have no first amendment rights under this argument. While the idea that a corporation can have a religion is specious at best, the idea that corporations can't have rights would render us a pretty insane world.
Indeed, it would be the end of organised journalism.
"Congress shall make no law ... abridging the freedom of ... the press." No prior restraint on publication.
And you could argue that content-based legal impositions on newpapers infringed the inherent speech and press rights of the individuals that actually produced the content.
Sweet summer child, legal personhood does not imply constitutional rights.
It would be trivial to establish by statute conditions for standing. As well as establishing other rights. One could even argue that certain actions against a corporation would be unconstitutional, by virtue of an inherent violation of the constitutional rights of the owners or constituents of the corporation (e.g., seizure of corporate assets without due process, barring a religious order from owning property). But none of this requires corporations have Constitutional rights, independent of the rights of their owners or constituents.
Of course it does, whatever colourful American expressions you trot out, the purpose of legal personhood is to establish, personhood in law.
The Left problem right now is just you want to cherry pick out of both historical ignorance and general anti-business ideological slant.
No. You can draft a corporate code describing various corporate forms, the rights of corporations, and the procedures for enforcing those rights without those rights being constitutional in any sense. You could, for example, state that any duly organized corporation under the code has all the rights of a natural person under the constitution, except (and then list exceptions). This would be trivial.
"otherwise entities like NAACP etc, NGOs, also legal persons, would have no standing."
Well, yeah, in cases in which, say, the NAACP has a contract dispute with a vendor or something. But generally when an NGO brings a lawsuit (esp. against the government), it does so via associational standing: i.e., a nonprofit can bring litigation if it shows that at least one of its members would have standing in their individual capacity, and that the injury/issues to be litigated are germane to the organizational purpose of the NGO.
So, it's not really the same as Amazon suing in the name of Amazon, for example.
And, as per usual, the Lout gets it all wrong. Is anyone surprised?
The Lout's reading comprehension isn't so good either; note that the person the troll was responding to was discussing the rights of corporations, not their personhood. Now fuck off back under your bridge, Lout.
i'm not a lawyer but i dimly recall from classes many years ago that courts have upheld the idea that corporations do have certain first amendment rights though limited, at least regarding commercial speech, compared to us flesh-and-blood types. obviously this is not commercial speech, rather commentary on the affairs of the day, which courts have held is clearly within the realm of the first amendment. this is such an egregious and obvious trashing of the first i can't see any court upholding it. and if you believe it's all politics, why would trump appointees want to defend the actions of his chief rival?
That "some but not all" is what gives the game away. Why some? Where in the text of any relevant document is the boundary described that demarcates the granted rights?
IANAL, but my understanding is that corporations were accorded the status of ‘legal persons’ strictly for the purpose of permitting them to be parties to contracts — earlier, only ‘natural persons’ could be. There was no precedent for granting them the additional rights recognized for natural persons as the U.S. Supreme Court did in Citizens United and Hobby Lobby.
The courts didn't protect ACORN. I hope they are more effective here.
ACORN wasn’t a profit seeking corporation, much less one of the nation’s largest profit seeking corporations. The courts usually have very little problem rubber stamping whatever the already-rich-and-powerful want, and Disney has more money and power than DeSantis or possibly even the entire Florida state government. Disney is heavily favored to win, IMO.
I looked it up:
Disney spends about $78B a year, entirely on sustaining and improving their empire
The entire state of Florida spends about $101B a year… but of course a lot of that is on things that have little to nothing to do with Disney, like running the state prison system, educating kids outside of Orlando, or building and maintaining infrastructure outside of Orlando.
I’m gonna guess that Disney has a lot more money to throw at lawyers than Florida does, simply because Florida doesn’t have as much ability to shift its current spending towards “fighting a single lawsuit.”
In at least one case, the courts did protect ACORN. One of the first "Defund ACORN" bills was struck down as unconstitutional because it was a bill of attainder.
Building a case. Patience
Indeed. Disney waited until the new DeSantis board voted to void the February agreements to bring suit. That act by the board is a very clear injury to Disney, and absent that, the case is a lot less concrete.
OK, show of hands: how many people in this discussion are actually lawyers, or at least attended law school?
[nervously raises hand]
Eagerly looking forward to Friday cat blogging!!!!
"you’re going to martial your economic might to attack the parents"
I have no idea whether the original mistake was made by De Santis or Politico but I don't think you have to keep repeating it. Either correct it "marshall your economic might" or add a [sic] to indicate that it's in the original.