Susan
sits left of most names
- Score
- −0.40
- More liberal than
- 72% of names
- Measured from
- 100,084 contributors
That ranking compares Susan with other names. The typical name scores −0.22, because people who donate to campaigns lean left as a group, so a name can sit left of zero and still be middle of the pack. The party splits below use a different yardstick again: each one is measured against an even fifty-fifty.
DIME contributor ideal points, 1979-2014. Negative is liberal, positive conservative.
Susan versus Sue
People who go by Sue rather than Susan sit 0.26 to the right of the full name. It is the same name. The difference is what people choose to be called.
How does Susan compare with someone else's name?
Party, by population
Different groups of people, measured in different ways. They do not always agree, and the disagreement is usually the interesting part.
Federal contributions, 2016 to 2026. Donors skew older and wealthier than the country.
Actual party registration, which is a choice people make at the DMV rather than with a chequebook.
Party registration again, in a state with a very different mix of people. Florida and North Carolina agree on which way a name leans 88% of the time.
Ohio has no party registration, so this is the last primary ballot each voter chose to pull.
Other donor records point the same way. Among donors to 527 organisations, Susan is 84% Democratic where that pool averages 71%, across 9,299 people. Among Washington state and local donors, Susan is 64% Democratic where that pool averages 55%, across 3,628 people.
Worth noticing: donors named Susan lean Democratic while registered voters named Susan lean Republican. This happens for about a quarter of names, and it is why this page refuses to give you a single number.
Is it the name, or the people who have it?
Names carry age, sex and ethnicity, and those predict politics on their own. Comparing every Susan in North Carolina against other registrants of the same age, sex and race leaves +0.17 that the demographics do not explain. The name still carries a real signal of its own, leaning Democratic.
Related spellings
Where Susan leans differently
| State | Democratic share of donors | Against that state’s own donors |
|---|---|---|
| CA | 74% | +0.44 |
| NY | 82% | +0.59 |
| FL | 51% | +0.54 |
| TX | 46% | +0.33 |
| PA | 68% | +0.59 |
| MA | 87% | +0.69 |
| WA | 74% | +0.44 |
| VA | 63% | +0.38 |
The right column compares Susan with other donors in the same state, so it is not just telling you which states are Democratic.