Aiken County in South Carolina is a great place to live, work, and play. It has a thriving economy with its many businesses and farms providing for the needs of the community. Politically, Aiken County is served by elected officials representing the citizens at the local, state and federal levels. At the local level, representatives from each of Aiken’s six municipalities serve on the Aiken County Council. The Council consists of seven members who are responsible for developing policies that benefit all of Aiken County’s citizens. They are also responsible for providing county services such as schools, libraries, parks, public safety and roads. The Mayor of Aiken is elected every four years and serves as the chief executive for Aiken County government. Additionally, state senators and representatives are elected to represent Aiken County in Columbia at South Carolina’s state capitol. In Washington D.C., two U.S Representatives serve on behalf of all citizens in Aiken County on matters related to national politics.
The political climate in Aiken County, SC is moderately conservative.
In Aiken County, SC 37.9% of the people voted Democrat in the last presidential election, 60.6% voted for the Republican Party, and the remaining 1.6% voted Independent.
In the last Presidential election, Aiken county remained overwhelmingly Republican, 60.6% to 37.9%.
Aiken county voted Republican in every Presidential election since 2000.
The BestPlaces liberal/conservative index
Aiken County, SC is moderately conservative.
Augusta-Richmond County Metro Area is leaning conservative.
South Carolina is somewhat conservative.
The BestPlaces liberal/conservative index is based on recent voting in national elections, federal campaign contributions by local residents, and consumer personality profiles.
VoteWord™
Displaying 20 years of Presidential voting, visualized in one word.
Aiken, South Carolina: R R R R R R
How It Works:
Here at BestPlaces, we were looking at the voting patterns since the 2000 election and realized that we could express the results of each election as one letter. R if the Republican Party candidate won, D for the Democrat and I for the Independent. The six elections (2000, 2004, 2008, 2012, 2016, 2020) would be expressed as six-letter word (R R D R R).
Then we went a little further and added the dimension of magnitude. If the difference of victory was greater than 10 percent, the letter is upper case, and lower case if the difference was less than 10 percent. This allows us to see interesting voting patterns at just a glance.
Here's the VoteWord for Iowa d r d d r. In the last six elections the state has been closely contested, voting narrowly for the Republican Party candidate in 2016 and 2020 after voting for the Democratic Party in 2008 and 2012. Virginia (r r d d d D) has voted for the Democratic Party in the last three elections.
Individual Campaign Contributions in Aiken County, SC
In the last 4 years (2018-2021), there were 3,140 contributions totaling $182,230 to the Democratic Party and liberal campaigns, averaging $58 per contribution.
In the last 4 years, there were 2,317 contributions totaling $370,699 to the Republican Party and conservative campaigns, averaging $160 per contribution.
(source: Federal Election Commission)