Florida’s Parental Rights in Education law, (or as critics call it, the “Don’t Say Gay” law) has struck major controversy since its introduction earlier this year.

©Disney

The Walt Disney Company has released statements criticizing the law including a few statements from CEO Bob Chapek himself. This caused Florida Governor Ron DeSantis to move forward with the dissolution of Disney’s Reedy Creek ImprovementDistrict — a district that gives Disney governmental power over the land in and around Disney World. House Republicans also condemned Chapek’s response to the law in an open letter and Disney employee walkouts took place following Disney’s response. Now, there’s a new update about the “Don’t Say Gay” law that could lead to the law being blocked.

According to Orlando Sentinel, a group of students, parents, and a non-profit organization have asked a federal judge to stop Florida school districts from carrying out the “Don’t Say Gay” law in schools. The new law halts any instruction that includes sexual orientation or gender identity for grades Kindergarten through 3rd grade and states that instruction must be “age-appropriate” according to the state’s academic standards for older grades.

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The motion for preliminary injunction was filed this past Friday in a lawsuit that launched in July against the school boards of Duval County, Palm Beach County, Indian River County, and Orange County, where Disney World is located. The motion mentioned that the law, “was enacted with the purpose to discriminate and has the effect of discriminating against LGBTQ+ students and those with LGBTQ+ family members.” The motion was created to stop the law from being used in schools.

©Ryan Faughnder via Twitter (@RFaughnder)

The motion continued to state that the law, “by design, deters speech by and about lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, queer, and questioning people in schools. To achieve this end, the law employs undefined terms that restrict an absurdly broad scope of speech and activity, casting a broad chilling effect and leaving school officials to draw arbitrary and discriminatory lines in their attempts to implement the law.” U.S. District Judge, Wendy Berger, was assigned the lawsuit.

Disney Pride Decoration

The lawsuit filed in July against the 4 Florida counties mentioned above is currently going through the federal court in Orlando. As of now, the attorneys for the 4 school boards have not filed initial arguments in the case, however in a separate lawsuit in Tallahassee, Attorney General Ashley Moody’s team denies that the, “Legislature acted out of animus against LGBTQ individuals.”

These are all of the updates we have on the motion and lawsuit, but stay tuned for additional information.

UPDATE on the Dissolution of Disney World’s Reedy Creek District