In the month of April 2022, Fla. Governor Ron DeSantis passed two controversial bills that restrict the freedom of speech and expression.

   One of the Fla. Bills targets popular theme park Walt Disney World. It will dissolve WDW’s private government “Reedy Creek” that has been around for 55 years. This bill was passed shortly after the Disney company expressed disapproval for the state’s “Don’t Say Gay” bill.

   After the bill was passed, Disney released a statement saying, “Florida’s HB 1557, also known as the ‘Don’t Say Gay’ bill, should never have passed and should never have been signed into law.” The company said they 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.”

   DeSantis claims he is targeting them because it isn’t fair to other companies. “No individual or no company in Florida is treated this way, and it’s not right to have this similar treatment but you know they had exercised a lot of power over the years.”

   In dissolving Reedy Creek, DeSantis is leaving local counties and potentially taxpayers having to pay off Disney’s $1 billion in government bond debt. Disney has yet to comment.

   The other bill passed by DeSantis is called Individual Freedoms. This bill is commonly known as “Stop WOKE Act,” with “WOKE” being an acronym for “Wrongs to Our Kids and Employees.”

   The bill is said to “prohibit workplace training or school instruction that teaches that individuals are ‘inherently racist, sexist, or oppressive, whether consciously or unconsciously’; that people are privileged or oppressed based on race, gender, or national origin; or that a person ‘bears personal responsibility for and must feel guilt, anguish, or other forms of psychological distress’ over actions commit-ted in the past by members of the same race, gender, or national origin.”

   DeSantis claims he is taking on “both corporate wokeness and critical race theory” and that he will not let “the far-left woke agenda take over our schools and workplaces.”

   The bill does not allow Critical Race Theory, or CRT, to be taught in schools, CRT is a college level program that teaches students how big institutions perpetuate racism. Essentially history about racism, Conservatives claim the goal is to not “make white students uncomfortable.”

   DeSantis is receiving negative feedback on both these bills and many claim it was unnecessary to pass these bills at all.