Fox News drew more than 12.8 million viewers to its coverage of the first 2024 Republican presidential debate on Wednesday.
That number is the combined audience for Fox News and Fox Business Network, according to Nielsen.
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The number is also much higher than the given expectations The absence of Donald Trump from the stage. Some analysts had projected an audience in the region of 5 million.
In the adults 25-54 demo, Fox News drew 2.82 million. The debate drew a total audience of 11.1 million on Fox News Channel and 1.7 million on Fox Business Channel. Fox News Digital also averaged nearly 200,000 minutes watched, the highest watched day on Fox News live this year.
Trump did anti-debate programming, appearing in a pre-taped interview with former Fox News host Tucker Carlson. Trump described that interview as having attracted more than 100 million views. That number had risen to 235 million by Thursday afternoon. But it’s not an apples-to-apples ratings comparison. Twitter/X counts even a second glance as a view, which means the number measures even those who scroll through Carlson’s post. Twitter/X states that “Anyone who is logged into Twitter and views a Tweet counts as viewed, regardless of where they see the Tweet (eg home, search, profiles, etc.) or whether they follow the author.” or not”.
Fox News drew 24 million viewers for its coverage of the first Republican presidential debate in 2015, a large number attributed in part to Trump’s presence in a field of institutional Republican contenders.
In 2020, NBC News, MSNBC, and Telemundo drew 15.3 million and 18.1 million, respectively, in the first and second nights of the cycle’s Democratic presidential primary debate.
However, cable networks experienced an overall erosion in viewership, and news networks were looking to make headway with the nascent presidential campaign. Fox News said the debate attracted the highest non-sports telecast rating so far in 2023, and also topped 70% of all presidential primary debates in the 2016 and 2020 cycles. The network also noted that the event’s viewership was greater than the January 2016 Iowa debate, which Trump also skipped. It averaged 12.5 million viewers.
The GOP debate, held at the Fiserv Forum in Milwaukee, featured eight candidates, with Nikki Haley and Mike Pence providing standout moments, but Vivek Ramaswamy also drew attention for his brash style and clashes with other candidates. Directed by Bret Baier and Martha McCallum.
the The upcoming GOP debate It will be September 27 at the Ronald Reagan Presidential Library and Museum in Simi Valley, California. Fox Business will broadcast this event.
On Wednesday, Fox News topped primetime with an average of 8.46 million viewers, compared to 1.74 million for MSNBC and 889,000 for CNN. In the 25-54 demo, Fox News averaged 1.77 million viewers, compared to 212,000 viewers for CNN and 191,000 viewers for MSNBC.
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