Senator Josh Hawley (R., MO.) is proposing new legislation — the Copyright Clause Restoration Act of 2022 — to end special copyright protections extended to the Walt Disney Company, and cap all federal copyright protections at 56 years, Fox News reported Tuesday.
Previous reporting from National Review indicated that Republicans in Congress were willing to let Disney’s copyright to its original, Steamboat Willie Mickey Mouse — which is scheduled to sunset in 2024 — expire. But Hawley’s bill would put an immediate end to protections on all copyrights exceeding 56 years of age.
“The age of Republican handouts to Big Business is over. Thanks to special copyright protections from Congress, woke corporations like Disney have earned billions while increasingly pandering to woke activists. It’s time to take away Disney’s special privileges and open up a new era of creativity and innovation,” Hawley told Fox.
Hawley’s legislation comes as yet another GOP response to Disney’s advocacy against Florida’s Parental Rights in Education bill, which states that “classroom instruction by school personnel or third parties on sexual orientation or gender identity may not occur in kindergarten through grade 3 or in a manner that is not age appropriate or developmentally appropriate for students in accordance with state standards.”
Disney has declared that its “goal as a company” is having the bill “repealed by the legislature or struck down in the courts.” Critics have dubbed the legislation the “Don’t Say Gay” law.
Last month, Florida stripped Disney of its special, self-governing status over the land on which Walt Disney World Resort sits. At a signing ceremony for the measure, Governor Ron DeSantis said that if Disney was going to use its “economic might to attack the parents of my state,” he would treat it as a “provocation” and “fight back.”
He also said that even if Disney had not commented on the Parental Rights Bill, taking away its special status would have been “the right thing to do.”
Representative Jim Banks (R., IN.), the chairman of the Republican Study Committee, exemplified Republicans’ attitude toward the company when he told National Review last month that “what’s good for Disney is bad for American children.”
“Disney’s profits will give the woke left more control over our kids and conservatives in Congress should oppose any legislation that would unfairly advantage Disney,” said Banks at the time.