The national advocacy group Color of Change is asking Gov. Rick Scott, R-Fla., to suspend State Attorney Angela Corey to halt the second prosecution of Marissa Alexander, the battered mother facing decades in prison for firing a “warning shot” at her abuser.

Alexander was arrested in August 2010 for firing one shot inside her Jacksonville, Fla., home after then-husband Rico Gray allegedly attacked her. Nobody was injured, but after refusing a plea deal for three years in prison Alexander was convicted in May 2012 of aggravated assault and given a 20-year mandatory sentence.

The conviction was overturned Sept. 26 by an appeals court, and Alexander was released on bail Nov. 27 after 21 months behind bars. Corey refiled charges and a second trial is scheduled to begin July 28. If she’s reconvicted, Alexander will receive a 60-year minimum sentence.

"The way that Angela Corey has conducted her job …. shows her to be a throwback to those Jim Crow era prosecutors and legal authorities – where there were instances of black people needing justice and they could not count on their local government official,” Color of Change Executive Director Rashad Robinson tells U.S. News. “I think Angela Corey is a bit unhinged and she’s playing for political points, and she believes she can make this black woman a target and win political points.”

So far, Robinson says, about 50,000 people have signed his organization's appeal to Scott. After 100,000 signatures are collected, the group plans to deliver print and electronic copies to the governor.

“These petitions are not just pieces of paper, these are the voices and stories of people who want to be involved in this effort,” Robinson says.

Florida’s constitution gives Scott the power to “suspend from office any state officer not subject to impeachment … for malfeasance, misfeasance, neglect of duty, drunkenness, incompetence, permanent inability to perform official duties, or commission of a felony.” The state senate is tasked with evaluating suspensions and has the power to either remove the official from office or rescind the suspension.

National Organization for Women President Terry O'Neill tells U.S. News she strongly supports the campaign to get Corey suspended.

"Any way to get her out of office and for her to stay out of office is the goal," O'Neill says. "She is either incompetent or just not doing her job correctly."

O'Neill says "the worst kind of stereotypes are being applied in the course of exercising prosecutorial discretion [by Corey] … that black women with guns are dangerous, that they need to be controlled … that stereotype of the black woman who can give birth then hours later jump up and be back in the fields."

She adds: "there's this whole stereotype that black women can bear any kind of abuse and keep working and being docile and submissive and accept any kind of abuse that's heaped on them. Well Marissa Alexander breaks that stereotype and Angela Corey comes down on her with both feet – to me that's playing into the grossest and basest kinds of stereotypes that our country has every created."

Alexander’s supporters point to Gray’s domestic battery arrests in 2006 and 2009 – and Alexander’s acquisition of a restraining order in 2009 – as proof her actions were justified. They also point to a deposition before Alexander’s first trial, in which Gray admitted: "I got five baby mammas, and I [hit] every last one of them, except for one.”

Corey – elected in 2012 to a second four-year term – argues Alexander fired the shot out of anger, not fear, and says two children in the home could have been injured.

Corey spokeswoman Jackelyn Barnard denies that the prosecutor is prejudiced.

"Ms. Corey's 32 year record of seeking justice for all victims, regardless of gender or race, speaks for itself," Barnard tells U.S. News. "As for the Marissa Alexander case, the State Attorney's Office is vigorously seeking justice for its two child victims and their father."

Responding to the campaign, John Tupps, Scott’s deputy press secretary, tells U.S. News "Angela Corey, as well as all state attorneys in Florida, are answerable to the voters in their districts."

Bruce Zimet, Alexander’s attorney, did not respond to a request for comment.

In addition to the Alexander case, Color of Change activists are upset with Corey’s high-profile failures to convict George Zimmerman and Michael Dunn of murder for killing black teenagers Trayvon Martin and Jordan Davis, respectively. Robinson says race should have been front-and-center during the trials. In an emailed appeal for signatures Monday, Color of Change also said, “Over the past 5 years, Corey has sent 21 people to death row – more than any other [Florida] prosecutor – 66 percent of which have been black despite the fact that black people account for only 16 percent of Corey's district.”

This isn’t the first time Alexander supporters have rallied against Corey.

About 1,000 activists joined Free Marissa Now coalition organizers on July 20, 2013, for a protest outside Corey’s office. They pointed in unison at the office, urging her to resign.

Rep. Corrine Brown, D-Fla., told U.S. News in October 2013 Corey is notorious among her constituents for overcharging, and that she wishes they would vote Corey out of office.

Harry Shorstein, Corey’s predecessor, weighed in on the Alexander case during a Wednesday appearance on “The Reid Report” on MSNBC. “There comes a point where things have been said and policies have been adopted that are antithetical to justice and I think [there is] a responsibility to speak out,” he said. Shorstein denounced an email Corey sent about Alexander’s case to Florida lawmakers considering changes to state law.