CNN’s Anderson Cooper Has Banner Thursday Night, Beats O’Reilly In Demo

Cable news ratings, May 5, 2011:

•CNN’s Anderson Cooper led CNN’s primetime–and all of cable news for regular scheduled programs Thursday night. AC 360 drew 681,000 viewers 25-54, the highest rating on the night for any regularly scheduled cable news program, beating even Fox’s O’Reilly Factor, which had 674,000. CNN’s primetime lineup swept MSNBC, with CNN’s Piers Morgan (495,000) outperforming MSNBC’s Rachel Maddow (349,000) by nearly 150,000 viewers.

•On Fox, the big draw of the night was special coverage of the — debate, which attracted 854,000 viewers 25-54 at 9 p.m., easily winning the hour. The 10 p.m. hour, which included debate coverage and post-debate programming featuring Sean Hannity, averaged 642,000 viewers in the demo, falling behind CNN’s Cooper.

Here’s the full scoreboard:

TV NEWS RATINGS: 25-54 DEMOGRAPHIC (L +SD)
5 pm	Beck 355	Blitzer 252	Matthews 193	Special 54
6 pm	Baier 284	Blitzer 258	Live 186	Prime 37
7 pm	Shep 435	King, USA 332	Matthews 199	Issues 72
8 pm	O’Reilly 674	InTheArena 321	O’Donnell 277	Grace 134
9 pm	Debate 854	Morgan 495	Maddow 349	DrDrew 92
10 pm	Debate/Hannity 642	Cooper 681	Schultz 255	Behar 89
11 pm	Hannity 642	Cooper 639	O’Donnell 198	Showbiz 92
TOTAL DAY	395	299	171	94
PRIME TIME	802	499	294	102
Data by Nielsen Media Research. Live and same day (DVR) data.

TV NEWS RATINGS: TOTAL VIEWERS (L +SD)
5 pm	Beck 1709	Blitzer 1023	Matthews 694	Showbiz 119
6 pm	Baier 1863	Blitzer 912	Live 646	Prime 199
7 pm	Shep 1805	King, USA 800	Matthews 783	Issues 250
8 pm	O’Reilly 2912	InTheArena 849	O’Donnell 1198	Grace 454
9 pm	Debate 3258	Morgan 1345	Maddow 1173	DrDrew 229
10 pm	Debate/Hannity 2132	Cooper 1585	Schultz 1046	Behar 293
11 pm	Hannity 2132	Cooper 1276	O’Donnell 604	Showbiz 242
TOTAL DAY	1507	848	592	237
PRIME TIME	3082	1260	1142	317
Data by Nielsen Media Research. Live and same day (DVR) data

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