Lindsey Graham's Not Alone: Lots of People Don't Email

Lindsey Graham, take heart: Up to 15% of Americans don't use email either and may not go online at all. The South Carolina Republican revealed yesterday during a conversation about Hillary Clinton's emails that he had never sent an email before. "I don't know what that makes me," he said on Meet the Press. Well, drawing on a Pew Research Center report from 2012, Five Thirty-Eight says that 9% of American adults haven't sent an email either. And a Pew report from last year says 15% of American adults don't go online for email, surfing, pinging, posting, or whatever. What's really unusual about Graham's email stance is the fact that he doesn't fit into the non-email group's demographic.

Per the 2012 report, just 3% of Americans with a college education say they haven't clicked "send" before—while Graham left the University of South Carolina in 1977 with a bona fide degree. And his $174,000 salary makes him more affluent than most non-email users; 97% of Americans making at least $75,000 say they've used email compared to 85% of people banking under $30,000. Whites are also more likely to have sent an electronic message. Only Graham's age (he's 59) makes him a closer demographic fit, but even then, 90% of adults in his age range say they've sent email before. So why doesn't he? "I've tried not to have a system where I can just say the first dumb thing that comes to my mind," he tells Bloomberg.