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Disney's Dirty Trick Renders DeSantis Board Powerless, New Agreement Has Absurd Expiration Date

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The empire has struck back, it seems.

Thanks to the strong actions of Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis, Americans finally began to hope that the ultra-woke corporate monopoly known as Disney would finally be reined in.

That hope may have been a tad premature.

In case you have been living under a rock and have not yet heard this monumental news story, for the past two years Disney has been in a massive political feud with DeSantis over the governor’s Parental Rights in Education Act.

The law forbade the teaching of sexuality and gender identity to young children in Florida public schools. Naturally, Disney sided with the woke left and spoke out strongly against the bill, resulting in DeSantis and the state government stripping Disney of its self-governing status.

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Earlier this year, DeSantis took a massive step towards dealing with Disney once and for all when he signed a bill that gave him control over the Reedy Creek Improvement District, Walt Disney World’s self-governing district, and to appoint his own board to govern the district.

Naturally, Disney was never going to give up without a fight. Now, as the new DeSantis-appointed board prepares to take control, a final dirty trick by Disney appears to render the new board powerless.

According to multiple outlets, including the Orlando Sentinal and NPR, the outgoing Reedy Creek board pushed through a new “Declaration of Restrictive Covenants,” which takes power away from the board and gives it back to Disney, meaning that Disney has the final say on all property alterations.

Effectively, this means that Gov. DeSantis’s board for the newly-created Central Florida Tourism Oversight District would have to run all decisions by Disney first, who could obviously reject them.

Should DeSantis give up the Disney feud?

To top it all off, the new declaration has an absurd expiration date rooted in obscure legalese. It turns out that the pact does not expire until years after the House of Windsor dies out.

The document is valid “21 years after the death of the last survivor of the descendants of King Charles III, king of England living as of the date of this declaration,” the declaration reads. That expiration date was set based on a legal doctrine known as the “Rule Against Perpetuities.”

Per NPR, the “Rule Against Perpetuities” states that a policy will continue until a certain person dies.

But Gov. DeSantis is not giving up the fight by any means. According to CNN, the new board is vowing to take legal action against Disney and the governor has warned, “you ain’t seen nothing yet.”

While onlookers wait with bated breath, members of the new, now relatively powerless, board are speaking out on Disney’s sneaky little move.

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“I cannot tell you the level of my disappointment in Disney. I thought so much better of them. This essentially makes Disney the government. This board loses, for practical purposes, the majority of its ability to do anything beyond maintain the roads and maintain basic infrastructure,” board member Ron Peri told WKMG-TV.

“So, I mean, I don’t know what else to say. I think these documents are void ab initio, I think they were an extremely aggressive overreach, and I’m very disappointed that they’re here,” Peri added.

The feud between DeSantis and Disney has been going on for a few years now, and it does not appear to be going away any time soon. DeSantis is clearly not going to give an inch, while Disney has an almost endless assembly line of high-priced lawyers who can continue to find these legal loopholes.

DeSantis has so far remained firm in every battle he has fought, and no doubt he will remain firm in this battle.

If DeSantis stands firm and is able to defeat the corporate kingdom once and for all, it will make him a real force to be reckoned with going into the 2024 election season.

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Peter Partoll is a commentary writer for the Western Journal and a Research Assistant for the Catholic Herald. He earned his bachelor's degree at Hillsdale College and recently finished up his masters degree at Royal Holloway University of London. You can follow him on Twitter at @p_partoll.




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