Book wins backing as Senate Democratic leader, will forgo statewide run in 2022

TALLAHASSEE — State Sen. Lauren Book will lead Senate Democrats as they head into a potentially bumpy election season that could be complicated by redistricting.

Senate Democrats on Wednesday held a closed-door caucus meeting in the Senate chamber, where they selected Book to take over as the Democratic leader in November 2022. After the short vote, both Republican and Democratic legislators could be seen hugging the South Florida Democrat.

The decision takes Book out of the running for any statewide campaigns, including a potential challenge to incumbent Chief Financial Officer Jimmy Patronis.

In a tweet, Book said she was “honored and humbled by the vote of confidence.” She added that for Democrats to “effect real & meaningful change w/o leaving anything on the table, we must fight for our strongly-held Democratic values that benefit everyday people.”

The post of the Senate Democratic leader came open after Sen. Perry Thurston (D-Fort Lauderdale) announced he would leave the Legislature in order to run for the congressional seat held by the recently-deceased Alcee Hastings, who died earlier this month at the age of 84.

Book, 36, was first elected to the state Senate in 2016. She is the daughter of Ron Book, one of the Capitol’s most successful and well-known lobbyists.

Book was also abused by a nanny when she was a child. She founded a charity — Lauren’s Kids — that has fought to increase penalties for sex offenders, especially those who target children.

Book was in the running to become Democratic leader following the 2020 elections, but the post was eventually won by Sen. Gary Farmer (D-Fort Lauderdale). The two have had a contentious relationship and it apparently flared up again on Tuesday night. Senate Democrats were supposed to pick Book following a meeting about Senate Democrats political operation, but Farmer objected.

Farmer showed up at the meeting and raised concern that there was no formal meeting notice, and that Thurston was leading the meeting. Farmer said he needed to lead the meeting for a leadership vote, according to two sources in the room.

“It was a unanimous vote, who the hell cares,” said a person who was in the room for the meeting. The person also said some other attendees were annoyed when Farmer created some slight drama.

Another person at the meeting questioned whether Farmer would have done that to a man.

Farmer on Wednesday denied that he raised concerns over a lack of notice, saying in a text: “That is absolutely not true. I was prepared to go forward with the vote. 2 members — female members — raised the notice issue. At that point the rule had been invoked so I had no choice. But I did not object.”

Farmer and Book have clashed in the past. She ran in the minority leader race in 2018 against Farmer in a heated contest that at one point led him to question whether Book could be caucus leader because she was also a mother.

He later issued a statement saying he “failed to properly express my thoughts about the difficulties that a Caucus leadership role can play for any individual when it comes to family life.”

Book will lead Democrats during a challenging period. Democrats had slowly been chipping away at the GOP majority in the Senate after the courts imposed new Senate districts but they lost ground in 2020 — in part because of a seat they narrowly lost to Ileana Garcia in South Florida that has triggered a criminal investigation.

But the current Senate map will be redrawn in early 2022. State law is supposed to prevent gerrymandering for political purposes, but the state Supreme Court has been reshaped by Gov. Ron DeSantis in the last two years so there are fears that the Republican-controlled Legislature could reshape legislative districts to cement their two-decade grip of power.

Matt Dixon contributed to this report.