Tallahassee, Florida - Disney made the latest move in its running battle with Florida Governor Ron DeSantis by launching a bombshell lawsuit over alleged governmental retaliation – but what chances does it actually have of succeeding?

The Republican governor and his political allies have waged a yearlong war against the entertainment giant to take control of the 27,000 acres of land administered by what was long known as the Reedy Creek Improvement District, which gave the company unusual self-governing powers.

Disney asked a federal court to invalidate the state's actions, reinstate its contracts, and protect its powers over the long term to control development of Walt Disney World, where it said it has plans to invest $17 billion over the next decade.

Disney's 74-page complaint, filed this week in US District Court for the Northern District of Florida, argues that DeSantis violated the company's 1st Amendment rights by retaliating against it for speaking out last year against the state's so-called Don't Say Gay law, which limited classroom discussion of sexual orientation and gender identity.

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DeSantis dismissed the lawsuit as an attempt by Disney to hold on to extraordinary privileges that aren't afforded to other companies in Florida. A spokesperson called it an attempt by Disney "to undermine the will of the Florida voters."

Disney has framed DeSantis's decision-making as not only politically motivated, but financially reckless and constitutionally baseless.

Legal and political experts said the lawsuit marks a significant escalation of tensions between a powerful governor and one of his state's largest economic engines. Disney is responsible for more than $1 billion in local and state taxes in Florida annually.

"It's mind-boggling – it really blows the mind – that it has devolved now to the point that we're going to have this massive lawsuit," said Aubrey Jewett, a political science professor at the University of Central Florida.

"It's amazing to me that the governor and the Republican Legislature are willing to savage Disney and risk economic growth ... over this one dispute."

Disney's lawsuit contends that concerns about its power emerged after it spoke out against the Parental Rights in Education bill – a claim it supports by quoting DeSantis and other Florida leaders making that exact point, which makes experts think they have a strong case.

"You kick the hornet's nest, things come up. And I will say this: You got me on one thing, this bill [dissolving the Reedy Creek district] does target one company. It targets the Walt Disney Company," one lawmaker was quoted as saying at the time.

Paul Barrett, deputy director of the Center for Business and Human Rights at New York University's business school, of said Disney's retaliation claim is a strong one because corporations have substantial rights to express their point of view under the 1st Amendment, just as individuals do, and DeSantis seems to have targeted the company for doing just that.

"DeSantis has publicly and repeatedly singled Disney out, and I think there is what the lawyers would call prima facie evidence – evidence on the surface – that appears to support the claim that the company is being punished because of its political views," Barrett said.

And that's just what's been said in public, he said – not what could be revealed in internal DeSantis administration communications laid bare through discovery.