Tuesday Ratings: The Last Word Up

Even with the volatility of the numbers, there are always certain sureties every night in the ratings: Bill O’Reilly will win the night, Fox News will have seven of the top seven shows, and Rachel Maddow will usually be in the top three of the non-FNC shows. On Tuesday night, O’Reilly captured 742,000 viewers in the 25-54 year-old demographic, but Fox didn’t grab the entire Top Seven; Maddow, who still had the highest non-FNC show, grabbed 351,000 demo viewers, which put her in fifth place on the night. She topped Greta Van Susteren, The Five, and Shepard Smith.

Still, even with Maddow cracking the Top Seven, the bigger surprise Tuesday night was probably Lawrence O’Donnell, who pulled in a relatively strong 252,000 demo viewers. And not only did he capture a larger-than-normal audience, he pulled closer to Van Susteren in the ratings. Maddow is still far behind Hannity in the demo at 9 p.m., but O’Donnell — who had his show moved from 8 p.

m. to 10 p.m. in October — now seems like the best threat to overtake a FNC show in the time slot (which, to be realistic, is a goal that seems entirely impossible for any show — O’Donnell’s just looks like the most likely). Van Susteren’s 332,000 viewers beat O’Donnell’s audience by just 70,000. There will have to be a perfect confluence of events for O’Donnell to overtake Van Susteren — continued strong lead-in performance from Maddow combined with further erratic ratings results from Van Susteren, for starters — but if there will ever be a crack in FNC’s impenetrable ratings armor, this is probably where it will occur.

Other nuggets from Tuesday night:

Nancy Grace had a strong night, with 219,000 demo viewers, which made her the third-strongest non-FNC show on the slate.

On a relatively low night for FNC, O’Reilly’s 742,000 demo viewers look even stronger than usual.

Just to follow-up on a weekend note that looks more fun in a new context, Mike Huckabee‘s GOP Presidential Forum on Saturday drew 408,000 demo viewers and 2.2 million overall viewers. As a reference point, the CBS Presidential debate, on a broadcast network, pulled just 5.3 million total viewers last month. It also aired on a Saturday.

Tuesday night’s full ratings:

TV NEWS RATINGS: 25-54 DEMOGRAPHIC (L +SD)
5 pm	The5  312	Blitzer  175	Matthews  169	Special  88
6 pm	Baier  388	King, USA  113	Sharpton  165	Prime  140
7 pm	Shep  315	Burnett  145	Matthews  195	Issues  133
8 pm	O’Reilly  742	Cooper  139	Schultz  177	Grace  219
9 pm	Hannity  480	Piers  103	Maddow  351	Dr. Drew  121
10 pm	Van Susteren  332	Cooper  173	O’Donnell  252	Behar  85
11 pm	O’Reilly  442	Burnett  114	Schultz  140	Showbiz  73
TOTAL DAY	310	130	146	90
PRIME TIME	518	139	260	138
Data by Nielsen Media Research. Live and same day (DVR) data.

TV NEWS RATINGS: TOTAL VIEWERS (L +SD)
5 pm	The5  1,550	Blitzer  699	Matthews  769	Special  355
6 pm	Baier  1,990	King, USA  444	Sharpton  760	Prime 418
7 pm	Shep  1,745	Burnett  438	Matthews  844	Issues  622
8 pm	O’Reilly  3,296	Cooper  499	Schultz  884	Grace  622
9 pm	Hannity  2,188	Piers  720	Maddow  1,180	DrDrew  331
10 pm	Greta  1,672	Cooper  625	O’Donnell 956	Behar  333
11 pm	O’Reilly  1,190	Burnett  358	Schultz 548	Showbiz  274
TOTAL DAY	1,378	486	561	257
PRIME TIME	2,393	616	1,006	420
Data by Nielsen Media Research. Live and same day (DVR) data

(Image credit: Damian Dovarganes)