South Florida Sun-Sentinel (Sunday)
Democrat Lauren Book in derailed Senate race
The nastiest political race in South Florida this summer is the battle for a redrawn Broward Senate seat between Sen. Lauren Book, the Senate Democratic leader, and Barbara Sharief, a former Broward County commissioner and mayor.
Both Democrats have political assets and liabilities. But it’s very unusual for a party caucus leader to face an intra-party challenge, and the last thing Florida Democrats need right now is more upheaval and instability.
Mainly for that reason, the Sun Sentinel recommends Book in this ugly, contentious race. We do so with little enthusiasm because Book has spent too much time and money attacking Sharief and not promoting herself. Sharief similarly accuses Book of lying, ties to special interests and conflicts of interest rather than emphasizing her own extensive local government work. This campaign has been seriously derailed and voters are poorly served as a result.
Let’s first dispel the myth in this race that Sharief is an interloper challenging an incumbent.
Sharief, 50, has lived in the heart of the district in Miramar for more than two decades. Book, 37, is a sitting senator, but she had to leave her Plantation home and rent a house in Davie to establish residency in the district after reapportionment.
Sharief is well-grounded in regional government; Book has the stronger command of statewide issues. Book knows how Tallahassee works, and Democrats need all the institutional knowledge they can get in the state Capitol.
Book’s personal story is widely known and she talks about it often. A childhood victim of sexual abuse by a nanny, she founded a high-profile charity in 2007 to promote public awareness of the threat of child sexual abuse.
The charity, Lauren’s Kids, has designed a curriculum for Florida schools and received millions of dollars from the Legislature.
Book has voted for budgets that contained large direct appropriations to Lauren’s Kids, sometimes $2 million a year. She insists that “not one dime” of taxpayer money pays her salary ($236,000 last year), and that a legal opinion from the Senate counsel concluded that voting for the budgets was not a conflict of interest.
Sharief called it an outright conflict of interest. Book’s campaign did not respond to a request for a copy of the legal opinion.
Sharief served as a Miramar commissioner, county commissioner for 11 years, and was president of the Florida Association of Counties in 2016. She was the first Black woman and the first Muslim to serve as mayor of Broward County. Running for Congress last year in a crowded field to replace the late U.S. Rep. Alcee Hastings, Sharief finished third in an 11-candidate field with 18% of the vote.
Sharief is CEO of a Pembroke Pines home health care agency where she earned $7.1 million in salary last year.
She agreed to reimburse the state more than $540,000 for overbilling the Medicaid program for patient services, the Sun Sentinel reported in 2013. In this campaign, a political committee aligned with Book has highlighted the case, falsely accusing Sharief of having “narrowly escaped jail time.”
One of eight children raised in North Miami, Sharief faced family tragedy as a child as her father, who provided for his family by selling clothes from a van, was shot to death on a Fort Lauderdale street by a teenage cocaine dealer when she was 14.
What makes this race fascinating is that Book has never faced the voters until now. She has been elected to the Senate twice with a “free ride” — no opposition, so her electability is in question. One reason Book is suddenly a fixture in 30-second TV ads is that she has to become known in a hurry. The daughter of long-time Tallahassee lobbyist Ron Book, she became Democratic leader last year when her Senate colleagues dethroned her predecessor, Sen. Gary Farmer, D-Lighthouse Point.
“(She) bought her seat with money from special interests and her Dad,” Sharief said of Book in a Sun Sentinel candidate questionnaire. “She is a hypocrite.”
A self-described consensus builder, Book sponsored a tax break for diapers in the Senate. She faced criticism last session for not insisting on a recorded roll call vote on her amendment to add a rape and incest exception to an abortion bill. Book said Republican women senators told her they would face political retribution from the GOP leadership if they voted for the amendment.
Sharief said Book’s decision let Republicans off the hook. Two leading abortion rights groups, Planned Parenthood and Ruth’s List, have endorsed Book.
The Senate district is 36% Hispanic, 18% Black and 32% white. This election is an unusual open primary: All voters can vote, regardless of party, because Republicans failed to field a candidate.
Book’s campaign raised $570,000 through July 22. Sharief raised $23,000, raising doubts about the breadth of her support. Sharief is competitive because she loaned her campaign $500,000, a large sum for a first-time legislative candidate.
That’s only part of the money story. Book knows how to raise money, and her father’s network of clients and connections surely helps.
A Book political committee, Leadership for Florida, has raised $3.3 million. Much of it is from special interests including $122,500 from The GEO Group, a private prison company that has faced scrutiny for sexual harassment and sexual misconduct — conditions seriously at odds with Book’s public advocacy work. Ron Book has been a GEO Group lobbyist for years.
The Senate is made up of 23 Republicans and 16 Democrats, with one safe Republican seat in Miami-Dade vacant. As caucus leader, Book is personally in charge of other Senate Democrats’ campaigns. Her party must maintain some semblance of cohesion at a critical juncture.
The authoritarian Gov. Ron DeSantis could easily win a second term, and a compliant, reckless Republican majority in the Legislature could gain a super-majority, leaving Democrats powerless to use even procedural maneuvers to slow the GOP agenda.
This is a perilous time in Florida’s history. Book is a determined and knowledgeable advocate, especially on education and health care. For the Florida Senate in District 35, the Sun Sentinel recommends Lauren Book.
Editorials are the opinion of the Sun Sentinel Editorial Board and written by one of its staff members. The Editorial Board consists of Editorial Page Editor Steve Bousquet, Deputy Editorial Page Editor Dan Sweeney and Editor-in-Chief Julie Anderson.