ORANGE COUNTY, Fla. – Geraldine Thompson won another term in the Florida Senate Tuesday, defeating former State Sen. Randolph Bracy III in a universal primary for Florida Senate District 15 Tuesday night.
The two Democrats were the only people running for the seat, so the primary was open to all voters.
Florida Senate District 15 represents much of west Orange County, from the northwest corner of Apopka to the Belle Isle area south of Orlando, including parts of Winter Garden, Ocoee, the Pine Hills neighborhood, Holden Heights and Tangelo Park.
Bracy and Thompson have represented the area off and on for years and both have accomplishments to tout in the legislature, as well as deep roots in the community.
Votes
%
Geraldine Thompson *(D)
Randolph Bracy (D)
(101 / 102)
Bracy — the son of the Rev. Dr. Randolph Bracy Jr., who founded New Covenant Baptist Church in Orlando — is a former state senator who represented Florida Senate District 15 from 2016 to 2022 before leaving to run for Congress. He lost in the 2022 Democratic primary to Rep. Maxwell Frost. The Florida Senate keeps a list of bills Bracy sponsored by session on its website.
Bracy says he wants to start a movement to better help people become their best selves. He has a number of priorities listed on his website, including increasing affordable housing, better access to mental health, and increasing activities for youth.
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Thompson — who founded the Wells’Built Museum of African American History and Culture in Orlando — won the primary in 2022 over now-former state Rep. Kamia Brown for State Senate District 15. First elected to the Florida House in 2006, the former Orange County school teacher went on to serve until 2012, then to serve in the Florida Senate from 2012 to 2016 when she left the senate to run for the U.S. House against now-former Rep. Val Demings. Thompson returned to the Florida House in 2018 ahead of her win in 2022, which secured her current position in the Florida Senate.
State data shows more than 271,000 of the district’s 408,000 voting-age residents are registered to vote. Florida Senate District 15 is also slightly majority-Black. According to Florida Senate data, 37.48% of voting-age residents are Black, compared to 30.96% white residents, 25.35% Hispanic residents and 8.1% residents of other races. Bracy and Thompson both have strong ties to the local Black community.
Thompson also has a number of priorities on her website, including expanding Medicaid in Florida, increasing affordable housing, and higher teacher pay.
You can find a list of bills Thompson introduced in the Florida Senate by year on the Florida Senate website. You can also see a list of bills she sponsored in her time in the Florida House on that website.
[RELATED: 2 Orange County Black leaders may face off in Florida Senate race. Why some say it’s a win-win]
Leading up to this month’s election, Bracy and Thompson have traded blows over residency disputes.
Bracy in June said he had a lawsuit drafted which would have challenged the validity of Thompson’s legal residence, claiming she did not historically or currently live in Florida Senate District 15 and had instead secured a homestead exemption for a home in Windermere that she bought in the 1980s. The drafted lawsuit, which was never filed, described itself as “a relatively straightforward attempt to enforce simple election laws” and sought to have Thompson deemed ineligible to both remain in her current seat and to qualify for the Aug. 20 Primary Election.
According to VoxPopuli, Bracy held a news conference to demand Thompson drop out of the race, yet Thompson showed up to the event to claim Bracy’s legal threat was a copycat maneuver of a complaint filed against State Rep. Bruce Antone by his election opponent, which waged similar allegations of Antone not living within House District 41.
Thompson’s Windermere home had indeed been located in Florida Senate District 15 up until the implementation of redrawn congressional maps that Gov. Ron DeSantis pushed through the legislature in 2022.
However, Thompson said she was currently living with her daughter in Ocoee to help her raise her children. Thompson’s voting record, obtained by News 6, shows her assigned voting precinct is in Ocoee and within Florida Senate District 15. Florida Senate rules on residency take into account the totality of a candidate’s circumstances.
Court records show Bracy never filed the lawsuit.
Thompson later in June would claim that Bracy was a resident of Lake County, according to VoxPopuli. Property Appraiser records reportedly show Bracy owns a home in Clermont and one in Oakland, both of which have homestead exemptions. Bracy told VoxPopuli that the homestead exemption on the Clermont residence belonged to the home’s previous owner, what the news outlet went on to confirm with the Lake County Property Appraiser. VoxPopuli otherwise cites anecdotal evidence from two of Bracy’s Oakland neighbors that they rarely see the former state senator at his Orange County residence ever since he closed on the Clermont home, adding the property is left unkept and routinely gets overgrown.
The Florida Statewide Primary is Tuesday, Aug. 20.
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