Emily For President C-SPAN Presidential Ranking President's Day Special
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As we’ve previously discussed here at Emily For President, my history education left much to be desired. But, what it lacked in diverse narratives or nuanced conversations about the problematic nature of history in general, it over and above made up for in just talking about all of the presidents all of the time.
As a result, I am very familiar with C-SPAN’s Presidential Historian Survey and have decided today for President’s Day, here at Emily For President, we will be ranking the presidents in our own various presidential rankings.1 C-SPAN’s 2021 ranking has been released so the research that went into these lists are as up-to-date as can be.
I should also note: this is going to be a very astute E4P edition as we are on the brink of both a major war and a new Covid wave. I could have just written another silly little Emily Fun President but in these trying times, I think it’s really important we genuinely research and reflect on our past.
Hottest Presidents (The Definitive Ranking)
Let’s just say it: this is the most important list you’re going to read today. You know it, I know it. We all think about which presidents could get it at least twice a day so it’s time to finally have this conversation.
This is the absolute definitive ranking of the Top 5 Hottest Presidents.
1. JFK (C-SPAN Ranking: 8)
I swear if anyone acts coy and says, “Noooo I would definitely put someone else as number 1,” you’re a liar and we all know it. We’ve all seen the documentaries. We’ve all read a history textbook. In every dramatic retelling of JFK’s assassination, it’s always the hottest actors doing foul New England accents getting caught cheating at some point.
JFK was hot. He also —and I know this is going to sound bad but it’s also true— died young so he will always be hot in our collective American memory. Forgive me for speaking very well of the dead but someone had to say it!!!
2. Young Richard Nixon (C-SPAN Ranking: 31)
CATCH YOURSELF BEFORE YOU COME FOR ME!!!! This is a controversial pick, to be sure, but look inside yourself and genuinely ask if I’m wrong. Because I’m not— you’re just scared to admit it to yourself.
I’d even say Watergate Richard Nixon had some hot high school principal who’s “going through something” energy which likely would have also made the list but that’s a conversation for another time. Young Richard Nixon, however, sometimes looks like Schmidt from New Girl but then also a little Christian Slater in the 1980s??? Like…. how could I not include him??
3. President Barack Obama (C-SPAN Ranking: 10)
There is absolutely no question that Obama is a.) hot and b.) even if he wasn’t, we still would have all been smitten after seeing him water skiing. You could never picture musty dusty John Quincy Adams on a water ski but if he had been, maybe he would have been ranked #3 out of hotness. Like we all looked at those pictures and felt a brief flash of serotonin, right? That was a shared experience and not just me??
I’ll also throw it out there: Obama looks better after whatever shit he saw during his eight years. Sorry for the trauma, but if that’s what it took to get us top button-undone, “my whole family is hotter than you, fuck your Christmas card” look…. Maybe it was worth it?
He’s also definitively the hottest of the living presidents, as he is ranked just above….
4. Fuck it I’ll say!!! Bill Clinton in the 1990s!!!! (C-SPAN Ranking: 19)
I don’t know who’s trying to deny this one but Bill Clinton (post-grey hair transition but pre-his whole new mouth-breathing thing) was hot.
You look at this man, with no context, and you would say that man is stately. You would call him a silver fox. You could say he is a smooth and fantastic hillbilly who should be declared Emperor of the United States of America.
5. Warren G. Harding (C-SPAN Ranking: 37)
I’m not taking any shit from anyone on this one. This is what Mr. Big should have looked like. This is the face of a man who got his BBA, went right into investment banking, and knows his way around a variety of red wines. THIS IS A HOT MAN!!!!!!!!
I get it: you’re not used to pro-Warren G. Harding content. It’s new, it’s scary. Well, get over it. Grow up and enter the real world in which we admit to ourselves that this man is more attractive than we were ever allowed to believe.2
Honorable Mention: Ulysses S Grant (C-SPAN Ranking: 20)
Grant looks like the kind of guy you would tell yourself you could fix, but there’s really no changing a man who looks like he can drink whiskey at any hour of the day and enjoy it. This is a man with baggage who theoretically should be in therapy but just isn’t feeling that right now and figuring out “what works for him.” This is a man who will blackout during a group party at a bar and would disappear to chain smoke with strangers outside for a majority of the time instead and you’ll find him and he’ll think genuinely nothing of it.
He’s hot but chaotic— the Civil War’s Pete Davidson.3
Most Ok White Men Award
This award is given to the top five presidents who just existed. They did things and we’re so proud of them for that!!
1. Rutherford B. Hayes (C-SPAN Ranking: 33)
You may think that a man named Rutherford would have told the southern states to secede from the Union but bestie Ruth was a “staunch abolitionist who defended refugee slaves in court proceedings.” We love a woke king!!!
Except he also truly did nothing in office. He was adamant about only serving one term (we love when he’s respectful) and seemed to have all of these great ideas, but during that one term, he —once again— truly did nothing in office.
2. Millard Fillmore (C-SPAN Ranking: 38)
Absolutely love the little-known historical fact that an oft-forgotten Baldwin brother, Millard Fillmore, was the 13th President of the United States. What did he do while in office? You tell me!!!! But we love him anyway!!
Also, this fun fact is 100% real but his actual political party was the Know Nothing Party. I am begging everyone to look up the Know Nothing Party and tell me your thoughts on that because, I can assure you, everything you will read will be as unsurprising as you can imagine.
3. Grover Cleveland x2 (C-SPAN Ranking: 25)
This man was elected to office twice and I could not tell you anything that he did. Allegedly, according to his Wikipedia, he did do some things. It also says that he was so deeply unpopular that members of his own party started to abandon him which is proof that things were done that people didn’t like (serving as inspo to D*nald Tr*mp in more ways than one….).
Unfortunately, I can’t find anything that I had the attention span to read about so in my mind, he’s done nothing.
4. Zachary Taylor (C-SPAN Ranking: 35)
This man’s Wikipedia page literally says, “Taylor died suddenly of a stomach disease on July 9, 1850, with his administration having accomplished little... Historians and scholars have ranked Taylor in the bottom quartile of U.S. presidents, owing in part to his short term of office (16 months), though he has been described as ‘more a forgettable president than a failed one.’”
That’s so sad so I had to include him in this list. He did an ok job.
5. William Henry Harrison (C-SPAN Ranking: 40)
This man just died a month after he was inaugurated. Like exactly 31 days. WHAT??? Why do we never discuss the absolute drama of this in school??? This is one of the most insane things I’ve ever learned in my life, coupled only with the fact that he is STILL RANKED HIGHER IN THE C-SPAN POLL THAN DONALD TRUMP!!!!! I think that’s the best insult a historian can ever deliver, wow.
Famous Presidents Who Are Not Hot
This section is for my fellas who are medium ugly but have done some pretty cool things. You know ‘em, you love ‘em, which is why I’m not breaking down their accomplishments again!!!!
1. Franklin D. Roosevelt (C-SPAN Ranking: 3)
Points Gained: WWII, New Deal, having a cool wife, surviving polio
Points Lost: Cheater (same energy as Stanley Tucci cheating), four terms
2. Lyndon B. Johnson (C-SPAN Ranking: 11)
Points Gained: Ideas proposed with The Great Society, contributions to advancing civil rights in the 1960s
Points Lost: Vietnam War, nicknaming his penis “Jumbo” and taking it out all the time
3. Dwight D. Eisenhower (C-SPAN Ranking: 5)
Points Gained: Being a part of D-Day, fighting McCarthyism and fearmongering
Points Lost: Executive Order 10450, looking like a hammerhead shark
4. Harry Truman (C-SPAN Ranking: 6)
Points Gained: Dealing with the Cold War, this photo
Points Lost: atomic bombs?????
Not listed: Ronald Reagan (C-SPAN Ranking: 9)
I’m not getting into the weeds of this conversation today. All I’ll say on the matter is that it takes a really special guy to secure a stash of controversial HIV/AIDS drugs for a friend despite not publicly saying the word “AIDS” until five years into your presidency and an epidemic.4
Presidents That Said “Gay Rights!”
In 2019, Mayor Pete Buttigieg stopped the presses by announcing that if he was elected president, he was almost certain that he would not be the first gay president. Now I can’t speak to the mathematical probability of this as I did actually try to do the mathematical probability of this and thoroughly confused myself.
However, Vice Provost for Global Initiatives at the University of Pennsylvania Ezekiel Emanuel wrote an article also in 2019 looking at how James Buchanan actually never hid the fact that he was openly involved with a senator, ambassador, and former vice president named William Rufus King. Shockingly, there has been very little diversity in the White House so we are taking this tiny shred and running with it.
1. James Buchanan (C-SPAN Ranking: 44)
I think the only reason I ever learned James Buchanan might have been gay was because my history teacher at the time might have been a little homophobic but we’re going to shelve that conversation away to focus on Buchanan himself.
Ranked dead fucking last in every single C-SPAN poll5, Buchanan, unfortunately, became one of those people in a relationship who adopts their partner’s whole personality to make them appear like a solid unit. As King was a follower of Andrew Jackson, proud bigot, Buchanan not only “intervened to assure the Supreme Court’s majority ruling in the pro-slavery decision in the Dred Scott case,” he also did jackshit to stop the Civil War.
I wouldn’t call this a win for the LGBTQIA+ community, but it was something that happened in history!!!
2. Abraham Lincoln (C-SPAN Ranking: 1)
Ok, I thought this was all just a bit from Will & Grace but then I googled “Was Abraham Lincoln gay?” and there’s an entire Wikipedia page dedicated to discussing Abraham Lincoln’s sexuality.
This one seems like a can of worms that I am not in the mood to open.
3. Joe Biden
Joe Biden is almost painfully straight but he’s having a hard week already so we’ll throw him a bone and rank him here. As much as we love Heartthrob #3 Barack, it was Biden who swung the administration’s compass towards legalizing marriage equality in the US.
We are going to end this conversation here because, again, while it’s good that this president doesn’t actively hate the LGBTQIA+ community like the last guy did, Biden has always sounded like a grandpa who just heard the word “yas” for the first time. Best to stop while we’re ahead.
Most Fuckable Founding Fathers
Finally, we’ve reached the end of our President’s Day celebration with a ranking of those named most often in car commercials. This one needs to be taken with a grain of salt because most of these men were slave owners which is definitely the biggest ick.
1. James Madison (C-SPAN Ranking: 16)
You do not get to tell me that you would leave a bar with a man that looked like George Washington if there was another option on the table. I get the man did great things and I forgot James Madison was a president until making this list, but fame can be as much of a turn-off as wooden teeth.
There’s no other defense for Madison, though. He just looks like he had the best skincare regime.
2. George Washington (C-SPAN Ranking: 2)
Again, he’s got the notoriety going so like you could say you did. But what’s there? What about this man past his name is appealing? Defend this one to me because it’s not there.
3. John Adams (C-SPAN Ranking: 15)
This feels like a follow-up to Washington but he comes after because it’s slightly less notable to be the second president instead of the first. He also, and this is saying absolutely nothing for Washington’s looks, is definitely a step-down. Loved him in Billions, though.
4. Th*mas J*fferson (C-SPAN Ranking: 7)
I don’t know if it’s simply the whole “having a family with your slave” thing and all of the fucked up things that conversation holds, but Jefferson has always given me major douchebag vibes. Granted, he has the most ok face out of the Founding Fathers but like… he just seems like the kind of guy on a date who would talk a lot about the stock market and his portfolio and then try to order wine for me because he’s like “just gotten really into reds lately” and I just… no. I can’t do this. He’s barely on this list, barely.
What a way to end President’s Day!!! Sorry to the men who didn’t make this list but honestly, you’ve had a chance to be amazing for 233 years— try harder?
Play along with our drinking game at home: take a shot every time you read the word “president!!!!!!!!”
To answer your question: yes, I am essentially admitting Harding is the sugar daddy of presidents.
Admit it: Pete Davidson is hot. I don’t get it either but I’m attracted.
A historical truth stranger than fiction that was further dramatized in Angels in America.
Grover was only ranked one time.