The Walt Disney Co. is tapping Morgan Stanley executive James Gorman to serve as its next chairman, beginning early next year. The entertainment giant also announced that it anticipates naming its new CEO in early 2026.
Gorman will become chairman on Jan. 2, 2025. He will succeed Mark Parker, who is leaving after serving on Disney's board for nine years.
Gorman is currently chair of Disney's succession planning committee. He serves as executive chairman at Morgan Stanley, but will be stepping down from that post at the end of the year. Gorman previously served as Morgan Stanley’s CEO from 2010 to 2023 and chairman from 2012 to 2023.
Gorman has previous succession planning experience, as he oversaw the process at Morgan Stanley.
“The Disney board has benefited tremendously from James Gorman’s expertise and guidance, and we are lucky to have him as our next chairman – particularly as the board continues to move forward with the succession process,” Disney CEO Bob Iger said in a statement on Monday.
Iger came back to Disney in 2022 after a period of clashes, missteps and a weakening financial performance at the company under his chosen successor, Bob Chapek.
Iger was Disney’s public face for 15 years, compiling a string of victories lauded in the entertainment industry and by Disney fans, before he retired in 2020.
Gorman said in a statement that by naming Disney's next CEO in 2026, it "will allow ample time for a successful transition before the conclusion of Bob Iger’s contract in December 2026.”
Disney is continuing to review internal and external candidates for the CEO position.
Shares of Walt Disney Co., which is based in Burbank, California, slipped 66 cents, or 0.7%, to close Monday at $96.62.
FILE - Chairman and Chief Executive Officer of Morgan Stanley James Gorman speaks during the Global Financial Leaders' Investment Summit in Hong Kong, Nov. 2, 2022. (AP Photo/Bertha Wang, File)
Disney names Gorman to serve as next chairman; anticipates naming new CEO in early 2026
Disney names Gorman to serve as next chairman; anticipates naming new CEO in early 2026
FILE - Guests pass a statue of Walt Disney and Mickey Mouse in the Magic Kingdom at Walt Disney World on July 14, 2023, in Lake Buena Vista, Fla. (AP Photo/John Raoux, File)
The men formerly known as the Central Park Five before they were exonerated filed a defamation lawsuit on Monday against Republican presidential nominee Donald Trump.
With Election Day two weeks away, the group accused the former president of making “false and defamatory statements” about them during last month's presidential debate with Vice President Kamala Harris. The group is asking for a jury trial to determine compensatory and punitive damages.
“Defendant Trump falsely stated that plaintiffs killed an individual and pled guilty to the crime. These statements are demonstrably false,” the group wrote in the federal complaint.
The men are upset because Trump essentially “defamed them in front of 67 million people, which has caused them to seek to clear their names all over again,” co-lead counsel Shanin Specter told The Associated Press in an email.
Specter had no comment when asked if there were concerns some see the lawsuit as purely political because of the group's support for Harris. “We are seeking redress in the courts,” Specter said.
Trump spokesman Steven Cheung decried the suit as “just another frivolous, Election Interference lawsuit, filed by desperate left-wing activists, in an attempt to distract the American people from Kamala Harris’s dangerously liberal agenda and failing campaign.”
Trump campaign officials did not immediately respond to emails seeking comment.
Yusef Salaam, Antron McCray, Kevin Richardson, Raymond Santana and Korey Wise were teenagers when they were accused of the 1989 rape and beating of a white woman jogger in New York City's Central Park. The five, who are Black and Latino, said they confessed to the crimes under duress. They later recanted, pleading not guilty in court, and were later convicted after jury trials. Their convictions were vacated in 2002 after another person confessed to the crime.
After the crime, Trump purchased a full-page ad in the New York Times calling for the reinstatement of the death penalty. At the time, many in New York believed Trump’s ad was akin to calling for the teens to be executed. The jogger case was Trump’s first foray into tough-on-crime politics that preluded his full-throated populist political persona. Since then, dog whistles and overtly racist rhetoric have been fixtures of Trump’s public life.
In the Sept. 10 debate, Trump misstated key facts of the case when Harris brought up the matter.
“They admitted, they said they pled guilty and I said, ’well, if they pled guilty they badly hurt a person, killed a person ultimately ... And they pled guilty, then they pled not guilty,” Trump said.
He appeared to be confusing guilty pleas with confessions. Also, no victim died.
The now Exonerated Five, including Salaam, who is now a New York City councilman, have been campaigning for Harris. Some of them spoke at the Democratic National Convention in August, calling out Trump for never apologizing for the newspaper ad.
They have also joined civil rights leader the Rev. Al Sharpton for a get-out-the-vote bus tour.
Prior defamation suits involving Trump have led to sizable amounts awarded to the plaintiffs. In January, a jury awarded $83.3 million to advice columnist E. Jean Carroll over Trump's continued social media attacks against her claims he sexually assaulted her in a Manhattan department store in 1996. In May 2023, a jury found Trump liable for sexually abusing her and issued a $5 million judgement.
FILE - The Central Park Five join Reverend Al Sharpton during the Democratic National Convention, Aug. 22, 2024, in Chicago. (AP Photo/Charles Rex Arbogast, file)
This combination photo shows, clockwise from top left, Raymond Santana, Yusef Salaam, Antron McCray, Korey Wise and Kevin Richardson, known as Central Park five. (AP Photo)
