The district included Windermere, Winter Garden, Gotha, Lake Buena Vista, Oakland, parts of Ocoee, and the Dr. Phillips, Horizon West, Hunters Creek, and Williamsburg communities in Southwest Orange County, FL.

Thompson was born in New Orleans, Louisiana, and moved to the state of Florida in 1955, where she grew up in the town of Perrine where members of her family worked in agriculture and construction.

In 2002, Thompson ran for the Florida House of Representatives from the 39th District, which included parts of downtown Orlando in Orange County, against Bruce Antone, Tiffany Moore Russell, and Jon Eason.

During the campaign, she attacked Siplin for his tenure in office, asserting that he was "ineffective" and focused more on talking about solutions than solving problems, alienating local leaders in the process.

In the Democratic primary, she faced Prince Brown, a retired Navy lieutenant and a public health consultant, and Fritz Jackson Seide, an accountant and real estate broker.

Thompson campaigned on her support for affordable housing for low-income residents of the district, improved public transportation systems, and on addressing crime by expanding economic opportunity.

Thompson campaigned on a platform of enhancing access to public education and job creation,[10] and attacked Siplin for relying on taxpayer-funded mailers, sent out by her husband's Senate office, to promote herself.

The Orlando Sentinel endorsed Thompson, praising her as a "serious person, and a champion for public education and job creation," while criticizing Seide for only running as a "Republican for this race so he could make it to the general election.

[19] In 2018, Thompson announced her intention to challenge incumbent Republican state representative Bobby Olszewski in House District 44, covering suburban southwestern Orange County.

[21] She subsequently amended her petition seeking the correct remedy, and the Court granted it, ordering DeSantis to appoint someone else from the Judicial Nominating Commission's list.