Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis defended his high-profile battle against the Walt Disney Co. during a debate on Wednesday night, while rival Republican presidential hopeful Nikki Haley criticized his treatment of the entertainment giant.
“The proper role of government, if it means anything, it’s to protect our kids, and I’ve stood for the innocence of our kids. It is wrong to sexualize the curriculum,” DeSantis said, when he was asked whether his feud with Disney
DIS,
squared with the conservative view that small, limited government is best.
The fight unfolded after Disney publicly opposed a 2022 Florida law that banned classroom lessons on sexual orientation and gender identity in early grades. The law, called the “Don’t Say Gay” measure by critics, was championed by DeSantis, and last year he and GOP state lawmakers took over a district Disney had controlled in retaliation.
“It’s wrong to tell a kindergartener, like Disney wanted to do, that you can change your gender, or tell a third-grader that you’re born in the wrong body, so I stood up against it,” DeSantis said Wednesday.
“Yeah, the media didn’t like it, the left didn’t like it, and Disney didn’t like it, and they’re the 800-pound gorilla in the state of Florida. Most people, most corporate Republicans, would have caved. I stood and I fought for the kids.”
He then criticized Haley, saying she was part of the “corporatist” element of the Republican Party.
Haley responded by saying Disney had been “woke for a long time,” and DeSantis only started to fight against the company when it criticized him, because he has “thin skin.” And that wasn’t the right approach, according to her.
“We don’t need government fighting against our private industries,” said Haley, a former governor of South Carolina and former U.S. ambassador to the U.N.
“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.”
In a separate attack against DeSantis, Haley criticized how his presidential bid has fared even with its big spending.
“You’ve got $150 million, and you’ve gone down in the polls in Iowa. Why should we think you can manage or do anything in this country?” she said.
Their remarks came Wednesday night during the 2024 Republican presidential primary’s latest debate, held in Iowa ahead of the state’s first-in-the-nation caucuses on Monday.
Former President Donald Trump looks on track to win the Iowa caucuses, as he has enjoyed a big lead in polls of the state’s GOP voters for months.
Trump skipped Wednesday’s debate, making it a two-person contest, and he instead took part in a separate town-hall event. He has 52% support in Iowa polls, according to a RealClearPolitics moving average of surveys, while Haley gets 17% and DeSantis has 16%.
New Hampshire’s Jan. 23 primary is expected to be a closer contest, especially after former New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie dropped out of the GOP presidential race on Wednesday afternoon. Christie hadn’t qualified for the Iowa debate.