Cheesecake Factory’s Biggest Fans Are Actually Democrats

The White House with The Cheesecake Factory decorations

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Thanks to Barack Obama, the Cheesecake Factory is now famous for something other than its ginormous portions. Indeed, the former president’s quip dissing Donald Trump’s decorating choices — “He’s got the White House looking like Saddam Hussein opened up a Cheesecake Factory” — put the family-friendly chain in the red-hot center of multiple news cycles, with the Trump administration responding to the “elitist attack” by dispatching Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent to actually eat at the place and then, on election night, having Cheesecake Factory food delivered to the White House. As if the election results weren’t hard enough for Republicans to swallow.

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What caught Rambling’s attention, though, was how Cheesecake Factory had been popping up on the cultural radar even before it started making headlines over Trump’s gilt complex. Two days before Obama’s joke, Netflix dropped season three of Nobody Wants This, which included a scene in which Joanne is considering Noah’s parents’ house as a venue for their wedding. “Candelabra, candelabra, candelabra,” her friend Sebastien intones while they examine pictures of the home. “Looks like a Cheesecake Factory. You can’t get married here.”

In September, Cheesecake Factory had a moment on TikTok, as well, after a Minneapolis nail technician posted a video recommending the restaurant’s Cajun salmon, tweaked with her own fussy modifications (adding shrimp, swapping in loaded potatoes, extra sauce). The video went viral, catching the attention of tennis ace Coco Gauff and online food reviewer Keith Lee (“This is a nine out of 10”), ultimately pulling more than 5 million views.

All this attention — even Obama’s joke — clearly hasn’t hurt Cheesecake Factory’s bottom line. The company recently reported third-quarter revenue of $1.03 billion, up 14 percent from the same period last year. Ironically, despite all the acid reflux-like outrage from the White House over Obama’s crack, the majority of Cheesecake Factory’s customers appear to have voted for Democrats in the midterms, at least according to conservative political scientist Richard Hanania. He crunched the numbers and found that voters who lived in counties that included a Cheesecake Factory tended to favor Democrats by an average of nearly 30 points.

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This story appeared in the Nov. 12 issue of The Hollywood Reporter magazine. Click here to subscribe.