Fox News Bleeds Viewers in Prime Time Amid Viewer Fury Over Tucker Carlson Ouster
AP Photo/Richard Drew
The shock firing of Tucker Carlson on Monday has left a major void in Fox News’s prime time lineup as Carlson. The network’s viewership at 8 p.m., once towering under Carlson, has been on an increasingly steep decline, losing more than half its viewers in the three days since Carlson last hosted.
On Wednesday, Fox brought in only 1.33 million viewers at 8, whereas Carlson’s last show on Friday had some 2.65 million viewers. In the first quarter of 2023, Carlson averaged 3.25 million total viewers and 443,000 viewers in the key 25-54 age demographic. While Carlson was edged out for number one in the quarter by The Five, he was on the rise and had beat The Five for the month of March.
All that came crashing down on Monday as Carlson learned he was out of a job and his time slot was replaced by Fox News Tonight, which has been hosted this week by Brian Kilmeade.
On Monday, Kilmeade started off with a very decent 2.6 million viewers and 294,000 demo viewers. MSNBC, however, received a bump in the ratings as Rachel Maddow not only topped Hannity, but brought in a very strong 356,000 viewers in the demo – which boosted MSNBC past Fox News overall in the prime time demo.
On Tuesday, Kilmeade raked in 1.7 million viewers, shedding some 900,000 viewers from the day before. This drop coincided with growing rage on the far-right of American politics as figures like Steve Bannon, Marjorie Taylor Greene, and Kari Lake declared war on Fox. Kilmeade brought in only 149,000 viewers in the demo, which landed him in third behind CNN and MSNBC and was the lowest demo rating for the hour on Fox since before 9/11.
Newsmax saw its viewership surge on Tuesday as former Carlson viewers switched over to Eric Bolling – a former Fox host – who saw his ratings increase fivefold compared to the week before. Bolling still had only a third of Fox’s ratings and it should be noted that Newsmax has failed to retain viewers from Fox in the past.
On Thursday, Kilmeade’s ratings dropped even further to 1.33 million viewers and 146,000 demo viewers – giving MSNBC’s Chris Hayes a rare win in the hour. While Kilmeade still more than doubled CNN’s Anderson Cooper, Bolling maintained his higher ratings and ended the evening with 510,000 viewers.
Notably, Fox News has still won the 8 p.m. hour so far this week with an average of 1.87 million total viewers and 183,000 demo viewers. MSNBC is in second with 1.55 million total viewers and 182,000 demo viewers, while CNN is in third with 599,000 total viewers and 131,000 demo viewers.
While Fox’s prime time average for the week has so far been 1.87 million total viewers, it too has been dropping as the week progressed. By Wednesday, Fox prime time averaged 1.49 million total viewers, which is a major drop from the first quarter average for the network of 2.09 million prime time viewers.
The big question for the rest of the week is just how low will Fox News’s ratings go and will a major drop at 8 keep dragging down Jesse Watters and Sean Hannity – whose shows come before and after the hole left by Carlson.
In the meantime, Fox still has a lot of ratings assets under its belt and those predicting some kind of permanent downturn at the network are overlooking the fact that The Five remains the number one show on cable news and Fox’s morning and day time programming remains leaps and bounds higher rated than its competition. Prime time, however, has certainly become a challenge for Fox’s executives to fix.
