Fictional portrayals of female presidents have therefore been meticulously crafted to avoid alienating audiences. Two trends immediately emerge after judging the small sample size of onscreen female presidents: Not one is an obvious Democrat, despite polls revealing Democrats are most enthusiastic about the idea of a female commander in chief. And only one seems to have been elected entirely on her own merits—the others were all either part of political dynasties or were vice presidents who filled vacancies when the need arose.

Pop culture has long been pegged for its role in shifting public opinion on social issues, such as gay marriage. Some critics have speculated that David Palmer, who played a black president on Fox's 24 from 2001 to 2006, warmed voters to the idea of electing Barack Obama a few years later (The Cosby Show has also been name-checked). If the race of a president on television could affect how voters feel on the subject, it stands to reason gender could have the same effect. Rod Lurie, the creator of Commander in Chief, has even said he made President Allen a Republican to address critics who thought he might be a puppet for the Clinton ’08 campaign.

In an electorate where women are more likely than men to vote Democratic, why would all of the female TV presidents be Republican or centrist? The short answer is: It's not a conspiracy. Showrunners and writers serve three masters when creating a show, says the producer Tom Nunan. They have to figure out what provides the most conflict in a series, what's the most unpredictable thing a show can do, and what might be predictive about culture. A Republican female president adds an element of unpredictability that wouldn't be achieved by writing a carbon copy of Hillary Clinton or Senator Elizabeth Warren.

According to Nunan, the vast majority of writers are left-leaning and usually create characters that represent the opposite of their own political beliefs. Because there have only been so few female presidents on TV, it appears to be merely a coincidence that most of them have been Republican. The nature of the show matters too: Party affiliation is presumably more important for a drama like The West Wing that touches on actual politics, as opposed to the more soap-operaesque plots of Scandal and Commander in Chief. Veep, meanwhile, makes a conscious effort to leave Selina's party deliberately ambiguous. In an interview with Politico, the show’s creator Armando Ianucci said “I don’t want to get bogged down in party politics and make it a comedy about being a Democrat or being a Republican."

Barring the political biases of the creators of The West Wing and 24, showrunners rarely tend to push ulterior motives with partisan projects, since they run the risk of alienating the network or a portion of the audience. “As a general rule, networks don’t like projects with agendas,” says Paul Schneider, chair of the department of film and television at Boston University.