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By JULIE HAUSERMAN
© St. Petersburg Times, published February 24, 2000
TALLAHASSEE -- Senate President Toni Jennings is always game for a joke.
On her 50th birthday last year, her colleagues surprised her by persuading 6-foot-1, 250-pound Sen. Ron Silver, D-North Miami Beach, to jump out of a huge cake wearing only whipped cream and boxer shorts.
Wednesday, during what would normally have been a staid ceremony to unveil her official Senate president portrait, the crowd gasped to see a Jennings look-alike stroll in. It was a man, in drag.
Tommy Hunt -- a deputy sergeant at arms at the Statehouse -- was a ringer for Jennings, wearing a snappy woman's blue suit, lipstick, black wig and a scarf -- Jennings' trademark -- draped over his shoulder.
"Tommy was a good enough sport to do this," said Jennings, an Orlando Republican who has to leave the Senate this year because of term limits and is running for state insurance commissioner.
Hunt first donned the Jennings outfit for a charity benefit last Halloween. Even Gov. Jeb Bush was momentarily fooled, Jennings said. The Senate president asked Hunt for a repeat performance as a way to lighten up the official ceremony.
Jennings was elected president of the Senate in 1996 and is the first to serve two consecutive two-year terms.
Her portrait, by Ann Manry Kenyon of Jacksonville, shows her in a dark green jacket with a string of pearls around her neck and a slight smile.
It joined the portraits of 49 other Senate presidents on the wall around the Senate chamber. Officials had to remove one portrait to make room for Jennings, that of Frank Adams, who served two non-consecutive terms between 1899 and 1903.
- The Associated Press contributed to this report.