Rick Scott

Rick Scott was born Richard Lynn Myers on December 1, 1952, in Bloomington, Illinois. He never met his biological father, Gordon William Myers, whom Scott's mother, Esther J. Scott, described as an abusive alcoholic. Scott's parents divorced in his infancy.

In 1954, Esther married Orba George Scott Jr., a truck driver. Orba adopted Rick, who took his stepfather's surname and became known as Richard Lynn Scott. Scott was raised in North Kansas City, Missouri, the second of five children. His family was lower-middle-class and struggled financially; Esther Scott worked as a clerk at J. C. Penney, among other jobs.

Scott graduated from North Kansas City High School in 1970. He attended community college for a year and then enlisted in the United States Navy. In 1972, he married Ann Holland, whom he met in high school, at a Baptist church in Kansas City. Scott had completed naval bootcamp just before the wedding. Afterward, he was sent to a naval posting in Newport, Rhode Island, where he and his wife lived for 15 months. He served there as a radarman on the USS Glover (FF-1098), which during his enlistment spent time dry docked in Boston and sailed to ports in Bermuda and Puerto Rico. Scott was in the Navy for 29 months, including training.

After the Navy, Scott and his wife moved to Kansas City, where he attended college on the G.I. Bill. He graduated in 1975 from the University of Missouri–Kansas City with a Bachelor of Business Administration. He earned a Juris Doctor from Southern Methodist University. The Texas Bar licensed him to practice law in 1978.

Scott made his first foray into business while working his way through college and law school, initially buying and reviving a failing doughnut shop (the Flavor Maid Do-Nut) by adding workplace delivery instead of relying on foot traffic. He later bought and revived another doughnut shop. After graduating from law school, Scott worked as an attorney at the law firm of Johnson & Swanson in Dallas, Texas.

In 1988, Scott and Richard Rainwater, a financier from Fort Worth, each put up $125,000 in working capital in their new company, Columbia Hospital Corporation; they borrowed the remaining money needed to purchase two struggling hospitals in El Paso for $60 million. Then they acquired a neighboring hospital and shut it down. Within a year, the remaining two were doing much better. By the end of 1989, Columbia Hospital Corporation owned four hospitals with a total of 833 beds.

In 1992, Columbia made a stock purchase of Basic American Medical, which owned eight hospitals, primarily in Southwestern Florida. In September 1993, Columbia did another stock purchase, worth $3.4 billion, of Galen Healthcare, which had been spun off by Humana Inc. several months earlier. At the time, Galen had approximately 90 hospitals. After the purchase, Galen stockholders had 82% of the stock in the combined company, with Scott still running the company.

In April 1987, Scott made his first attempt to buy the Hospital Corporation of America (HCA). While still a partner at Johnson & Swanson, Scott formed the HCA Acquisition Company with two former executives of Republic Health Corporation, Charles Miller and Richard Ragsdale. With financing from Citicorp conditional on acquisition of HCA, the proposed holding company offered $3.85 billion for 80 million shares at $47 each, intending to assume an additional $1.2 billion in debt, for a total $5 billion deal. After HCA declined the offer, the bid was withdrawn.

In 1994, Columbia Hospital Corporation merged with HCA, "forming the single largest for-profit health care company in the country." Scott became CEO of Columbia/HCA. According to The New York Times, "[in] less than a decade, Mr. …

In February 2009, Scott founded Conservatives for Patients' Rights (CPR), which he said was intended to put pressure on Democrats to enact health care legislation based on free-market principles. As of March 2009, he had given about $5 million for a planned $20 million ad campaign by CPR.

On April 9, 2010, Scott announced his candidacy for the Republican nomination for governor of Florida.

Susie Wiles, former communications chief to Jacksonville Mayor John Peyton, was Scott's campaign manager, and Tony Fabrizio was his chief pollster. It was reported on May 7 that Scott's campaign had already spent $4.7 million on television and radio ads. His first video advertisement was released to YouTube on April 13.

During the primary campaign, Scott's opponent, Bill McCollum, made an issue of Scott's role at Columbia/HCA. Scott countered that the FBI had never targeted him. Marc Caputo of the Miami Herald contended that a 1998 bill McCollum sponsored would have made it more difficult to prosecute Medicare fraud cases, and was counter to his current views and allegations. Scott won the August primary with 46.4% of the vote to McCollum's 43.4%.

In the general election, Scott faced Democratic nominee Alex Sink. By October 25, Scott had spent $60 million of his own money on the campaign, compared to Sink's reported $28 million. Scott campaigned as part of the Tea Party movement.

The Fort Myers News-Press quoted Scott as saying he had spent roughly $78 million of his own money on the campaign, although other figures indicate he spent slightly over $75 million. He defeated Sink by around 68,000 votes, or 1.29%. He took office as the 45th governor of Florida on January 4, 2011.

In October 2011, Scott announced that he would run for reelection in 2014. His political funding committee, Let's Get to Work, had raised $28 million for his campaign as of May 2014.

As of early June 2014, Scott had spent almost $13 million since March on television advertisements attacking former governor Charlie Crist, who then appeared to be the likely Democratic nominee, and who was eventually nominated. The ads resulted in a tightening of the race, mainly due to a decline in Crist's favorability ratings, while Scott's favorability ratings did not increase.

By late September 2014, Scott's television ad spending had exceeded $35 million and in mid-October reached $56.5 million, compared to $26.5 million by Crist. …

On April 20, 1972, Scott, then aged 19, married his high school sweetheart, Frances Annette Holland (born May 11, 1952), who was also 19 years old. The couple has two daughters and six grandsons. They live in Naples, Florida, and are founding members of Naples Community Church.

Scott was swatted in December as part of the 2023 swatting of American politicians. His residence was the target of another swatting attempt in November 2025, though he was not home at the time of the incident.