By SILAS MORGAN AND JEFFREY SCHWEERS / ORLANDO SENTINEL/TNS
State Sen. Geraldine Thompson, a longtime Central Florida lawmaker, educator and civil rights champion, died at her Windermere home after complications from knee replacement surgery, her family announced late Thursday, Feb. 13.
Thompson, 76, a Democrat, served in the Florida Legislature for nearly all of the last 18 years. She was remembered as a trailblazer and civil rights icon, with many state and local politicians, Democrats and Republicans alike, offering tributes after her family shared news of her death.
Her family said she would be remembered for her achievements but also as their beloved matriarch.
“Senator Geraldine Thompson was so much more than a dedicated public servant and visionary leader,” the statement released by the Thompson family said. “She was a devoted wife, mother, grandmother and great-grandmother whose love, wisdom and compassion shaped their lives and the lives of so many in their community and across the state.”
Thompson was a former Orange County school teacher and Valencia College administrator and the founder of the Wells’ Built Museum of African American History and Culture in Orlando.
Re-elected in 2022
First elected to state office in 2006, Thompson represented parts of Orlando and western Orange County in the Florida House for a period spanning nearly 20 years, advocating for public education and voting rights. She served in the House until 2012 and again from 2018 to 2022.
She served in the Florida Senate from 2012 to 2016 and from 2022 until her death. She had just been re-elected in November after a contentious primary battle against the son of her longtime friend and former college roommate.
Gov. Ron DeSantis must schedule a special election to fill out the remainder of her term.
“You never wondered where she was. You never wondered if she was going to do something convenient or political,” said Thompson’s longtime friend Linda Chapin, Orange County’s first mayor. “Geraldine spoke the truth as she saw it,” Chapin said. “She was almost always right.”
Thompson worked for years to get the state’s public schools to improve the teaching of Black history and pushed last year for the state to select Eatonville — the historically Black town in her district — as the site of a proposed Florida Black history museum.
She criticized the DeSantis administration when the state refused to allow public schools to offer an Advanced Placement African American studies class and called the state’s new Black history standards a watered-down version of America’s past.
“It’s an attempt to whitewash our history,” she said after the standards were approved.
Thompson testified in a federal court case challenging Florida’s 2021 election law as unconstitutional, arguing the new law “made no sense” given local elections officials had reported no problems.
She also championed new amusement ride safety regulations in 2022 after 14-year-old Tyre Sampson plummeted to his death after falling off the Orlando FreeFall drop tower in ICON Park on International Drive.
And Thompson successfully challenged a DeSantis Supreme Court nominee in 2020 who failed to meet the minimum qualifications for the position. The state’s high court handed DeSantis a rare loss when it ruled, he must choose a “constitutionally eligible nominee.”
His nominee, Renatha Francis, had not been a Florida Bar member for at least 10 years at the time of her appointment, as required. He had to delay appointing her until 2022.
The Florida Department of Law Enforcement filed an ethics complaint against Thompson in 2021, which Thompson said was in retaliation for her lawsuit against DeSantis. The Commission on Ethics found no probable cause of wrongdoing.
Chapin said her friend, though “such a force in the last decades,” faced a “difficult beginning” in a county that did not integrate its schools until the early 1970s. “This was still a conservative community.”
At a community forum in Maitland in 2017, Thompson recounted one of those experiences after her husband, Emerson, became the first Black judge in Orange County.
“And there was a group that organized a reception for the judges’ wives, and I got the invitation, responded that I was coming, and I got a call saying that it was at the Orlando Country Club — and that the Orlando Country Club had a policy of No Jews, No Blacks and No Dogs,” Thompson said.
“I said, ‘It is my intention to attend that function so that if you’re going to call the police, you need to call them now, because I’m coming,” she remembered.
Another judge’s wife then offered to pick up Thompson so they could go together. That woman’s approach was, “If they arrest you, they’ll have to arrest me,” Thompson said, and that attitude helped. “When we make it our problem, then we put a stop to it,” she added.
A ‘force’ and a ‘trailblazer’
State Rep. Anna Eskamani, D-Orlando, who served with Thompson in the Legislature, said she was inspired by the lawmaker when she met her while a student at the University of Central Florida.
“Whether it was reproductive rights, voter rights and fighting for Black history, she always just picked up that microphone with such grit and grace,” Eskamani said.
U.S. Rep Maxwell Frost, D-Orlando, called Thompson a “force” and a “trailblazer” in a statement.
“For nearly 20 years in the Florida Legislature, she broke barriers and created opportunities, especially for Black and Brown communities and those too often overlooked. She paved the way for many, including myself, to step up and serve our communities,” he said.
Orange County Mayor Jerry Demings remembered her as a “tireless advocate for the underprivileged.”
Senate President Ben Albritton, a Republican, shared news of her death in a letter to Senate colleagues. He said she was a “force to be reckoned with,” a lawmaker known for her passion for education. Her “watchful eye, cheerful smile, and thoughtful, well-researched, and spirted debate will be greatly missed,” he said.
The Senate President’s Office is working with the family on setting a date for a memorial service at the Capitol.
Thompson was born in New Orleans and moved to Florida as a young child, according to her biography on the Florida Senate’s website. She earned a bachelor’s degree from the University of Miami and a master’s from Florida State University.
She and her husband had three children and six grandchildren, the website said.
Her roommate at University of Miami was Lavon Wright Bracy, who was maid of honor at Thompson’s wedding and Thompson was one of Bracy’s bridesmaids.
Last year, when Bracy’s son, Randolph Bracy, challenged Thompson’s bid for reelection to the Senate, his sister, State Rep. Lavon Bracy Davis, caused a stir by endorsing Thompson over her brother.
“Our bond went beyond politics — it was rooted in love, history, and an unshakable commitment to one another,” Bracy Davis said in a prepared statement. “She mentored me, believed in me, and pushed me to be better. Together, we passed meaningful legislation that made a real difference in the lives of our constituents.”
The two lawmakers held town hall meetings, partnered on Juneteenth celebrations and Black Caucus events, Bracy Davis said.
“Her absence leaves a void that can never truly be filled.”
