A “silent majority” of Disney employees support Florida’s parental-rights law that a “loud minority” at the company has labeled “Don’t Say Gay,” according to Jose Castillo, a current Walt Disney Company employee who is running for Congress as a Republican.
Jose Castillo, a resort duty manager at the Walt Disney Company who is based in Orlando, told Fox News Digital that there’s “immense pressure to toe the company line … However, the reality is that those drawing attention to this issue are in the minority. The Disney cast members who support the parental rights defended by HB 1557 far outnumber those who are protesting against it.”
Castillo is a candidate for the representative seat in U.S. House Florida District 9.
He told Fox that “Disney and similar corporations listen to the loudest voices in the crowd,” even though the “silent majority” of employees disagree. “That is why I am standing up for our shared conservative values; to show other conservative cast members like me that we need to speak up and stand strong.”
TheWrap has reached out to Disney for comment on Castillo’s remarks.
Before its passage, Disney chief Bob Chapek initially had a tepid response to the legislation, which passed and was signed earlier this month.
LGBTQ+ employees and allies at Disney protested what they saw as an insufficient condemnation of the Florida bill, which prohibits classroom instruction on sexual and gender identity preferences in grades K-3. Branded by critics as the “Don’t Say Gay” bill, H.B. 1557 does not ban the word “gay” or casual discussions of related topics in the classroom.
With that, Chapek and Disney adopted a more aggressive opposition stance.
“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,” read the statement, posted on the Walt Disney Company’s Twitter page March 28. “Our goal as a company is for this law to be repealed by the legislature or struck down in the courts, and we remain committed to supporting the national and state organizations working to achieve that.”
