Sun Sentinel Palm Beach Edition
Lawmakers poised to surrender to DeSantis’ demands
The worst instincts of Gov. Ron DeSantis, and the impotence of the Legislature that should be restraining him, are on full display in this week’s special session.
Nothing is on the agenda that can’t wait until the regular session begins March 7. The pressure is on lawmakers to do what the governor demands, and do it as quickly as possible, without thinking too much about it.
His vendetta against Disney leads that list. House Bill 9B appears to strip the company of all control over the infrastructure and public safety facilities of Walt Disney World, Florida’s premier tourist attraction. It does that by renaming Disney’s Reedy Creek Improvement District as the Central Florida Tourism Oversight District, whose five trustees the governor would appoint. In addition to sacking the present directors chosen by Disney, the bill forbids anyone connected with Disney or any other theme park company from serving on the new board for three years. That reeks of sheer spite.
If the bill is enacted, DeSantis becomes Disney World’s overlord.
This is the sequel to last year’s legislation that simply abolishes the Reedy Creek district, effective June 1, as the punishment for Disney’s mild criticism of DeSantis’ education censorship legislation. In delaying the effective date, the Legislature tacitly acknowledged that it didn’t know the implications of what it was doing.
Should the Legislature let the district be abolished, taxpayers of Orange and Osceola counties would be on the hook to pay off Reedy Creek’s $1 billion in bonded debt, which would immediately be in default. Nobody seems to have thought about that a year ago.
Much of HB 9B is devoted to declaring that the debt is unimpaired and that the new district will pay it. That depends, though, on whether the bondholders or the courts would accept that. Should they declare default, it would mean enormously expensive litigation and most certainly a hit to the state’s credit rating. Disney has deployed 42 lobbyists, many of them lawyers, to warn the Legislature against what it’s about to do.
Moreover, the Legislature is handling this issue as a local bill despite its enormous statewide significance. That violates the Senate’s rules, which call for local bills to be advertised locally and approved by the governments affected. Rules can be waived, however, by a two-thirds vote.
In 1819, the U.S. Supreme Court forbade states from impairing contracts. Florida’s Constitution has an explicit prohibition. Those bonds are contracts. Although the bill purports to respect that, it also makes a fundamental change to the entity that owes them. These issues could be avoided by simply repealing the law abolishing Reedy Creek. The Legislature should do that rather than pass HB 9B.
Only one other subject on the special session agenda bears enough urgency to belong there. That’s Senate Bill 2B, which provides more money to help the recovery from hurricanes Ian and Nicole.
Two other special session bills shouldn’t become law now or ever. As the minority Democrats assert, their obvious purpose is to bail DeSantis out of other troubles. But those bills are on a fast track too, with the Senate scheduled to pass them Wednesday.
SB 4B would expand the statewide prosecutor’s jurisdiction to cover all offenses related to elections and voter registration, playing into DeSantis’ demagoguery. The handful of illegal registration cases his election cops uncovered are being dismissed by judges because the statewide prosecutor has no jurisdiction over purely local crimes — and shouldn’t.
The other wrongful legislation, SB 6B, would get DeSantis off the hook of a lawsuit for unlawfully spending $1.5 million to fly immigrants from Texas to Martha’s Vineyard. It would give him another $10 million to transport asylum-seeking people from anywhere in the country to anywhere he chooses.
That makes the Legislature an echo chamber for DeSantis’ political propaganda (he’s expected to run for president) and pillages taxpayers.
Florida is hardly overrun with asylum seekers, who in any case are here legally while their applications are adjudicated.
DeSantis is as entitled as anyone to criticize how the federal government deals with asylum-seekers. But he has no business setting himself up as a rival immigration agency to score points for a presidential campaign. The Legislature should kill that bill, too.
The Sun Sentinel Editorial Board consists of Editorial Page Editor Steve Bousquet, Deputy Editorial Page Editor Dan Sweeney, and Editor-in-Chief Julie Anderson. Editorials are the opinion of the Board and written by one of its members or a designee. To contact us, email at letters@sun-sentinel.com.