(The following article is the third, and final part, of a three part series. Parts I and II may be found here, and here.)
Last fall, the Florida legislature introduced the Parental Rights in Education bill limiting classroom discussion about sexual orientation or gender identity in kindergarten through third grade.
In a broad misreading of the bill, the press and the opposition called it the "Don't Say Gay" bill. On cue, social media went ballistic, and Disney felt the pressure.
Then things got really ugly, with Gov. Ron DeSantis, R-Fla., threatening to revoke the special tax status that had effectively allowed Disney to self-govern the massive resort.
"At the end of the day, you got to do what's right. They basically had gotten anything they wanted for 60 years. . .
"They threatened to sue us over the legislation, but it really exposed them for this ridiculous arrangement that they've enjoyed, where they had their own government and they're able to basically just live in their own little island, do whatever they want with no oversight, so we felt that that has outlived its usefulness," he said.
"I think most people believe it was the right thing to do. People thought because I was tangling with Disney, it was going to hurt me in the election, but in Osceola County, which is where most Disney employees live, I won for the first time as governor and (was) the first Republican who won that county in a while," he said.
"I think we won it by 7 points. Hillary (Clinton), I think, won it by 20 points, so clearly, people responded to what we were doing," he said.
While the culture war fodder gets much of the attention, the day before our interview,
Gov. DeSantis rolled out a comprehensive tax reform bill aimed directly at the middle class he grew up in — his mother was a nurse, his father installed Nielsen ratings boxes, and both hail from the Great Lakes Rust Belt.
"Inflation has been the biggest problem people try to deal with. Now that's caused by Washington. It's not, obviously, caused by the state of Florida," he said.
"But we want to do what we can to mitigate it, so we did a billion in tax relief in last year's budget. We just did the $500 billion toll relief, so if you're a commuter, once you hit the certain number of tolls in a month, next month you get 50% rebated back to your SunPass.
"So that's going to save the average commuter $500 a year and probably in Miami maybe $1,000 a year because there's a lot of tolls, so that's something that helps people," he said.
"And then these other things with $25 under household items, no sales tax, the baby items, no sales tax, all these things I think just make a difference to middle-class families," he said.
To the rest of the country, the presidential race may already be underway.
But Floridians first and foremost need, and still have, a governor. DeSantis's challenge is to continue to make sure that delicate balancing act, and not the barbs coming from his would-be rivals in both parties, commands his full attention.
(A related story may be found here.)
Salena Zito has held a long, successful career as a national political reporter. She worked for the Pittsburgh Tribune-Review for 11 years, and has interviewed every U.S. president and vice president since 1992, as well as other top D.C. leaders. She joined the New York Post in September 2016, and acts as a CNN political analyst, and also as a reporter and columnist for the Washington Examiner. Read Salena Zito's Reports — More Here.