The governor and cabinet are appealing a federal court order to revamp Florida's system for restoring the voting rights of former felons.
Scott says he's appealing the court order because this decision should be made by elected officials... not a federal judge.
Damien Filer, with the organization Progress Florida, contends that Rick Scott is defending a system that has disenfranchised more than a million Floridians... many of them African Americans.
"This governor really appears to be hearkening back to the day of Jim Crow politics, and it really is sad," he said.
A federal judge ruled that Florida's clemency system violates the U.S. Constitution, and the state has to come up with a system that doesn't.
In what could be seen as awkward timing, Scott went to court to defend the process that denies voting rights to more than a million Floridians on the 50th anniversary of the death of Martin Luther King, Jr.