Fox News Trounced CNN and MSNBC With Democrats and Independents on Inauguration Day
Fox News not only trounced the competition in total viewers during President Donald Trump’s Monday inauguration, but new data from Nielsen MRI Research shows the network also far outpaced its competitors with Democrats and independents.
While overall viewership for the event was down to only 24.50 million viewers across all cable and broadcast news networks, Fox News brought in 10.67 million of those viewers. For comparison, Joe Biden’s 2021 inauguration scored 33.76 million viewers and Trump’s 2016 swearing-in saw 30.64 million viewers across the 15 major news outlets. The drop is considered as both standard for a second inauguration and a further indication of linear television’s struggle to keep its audience as digital platforms and streaming continue to attract more and more news consumers.
ABC News trailed Fox with 4.85 million viewers, followed by NBC News’s 4.58 million, CBS’s 4.35 million, CNN’s 1.8 million, and MSNBC’s 880,000.
Of the cable news audience, Fox raked in a whopping 72% of all Democrats tuned in, 78% of all independents, and 88% of all Republicans. CNN brought in 18% of Democrats, while MSNBC secured 11%. As for independents, CNN accounted for 14% while MSNBC had only 8% of those viewers. Only 8 and 4 percent of Republicans tuned into CNN and MSNBC, respectively, on Inauguration Day.
The numbers also fall in line with Fox’s total share of the cable news audience on Inauguration Day, which peaked at 79% of all viewers during the 4 p.m. hour on Monday – the highest share in the network’s history.
The network continues to show its across the board dominance in regular programming as it aired the top 102 cable news telecasts last week, meaning MSNBC’s highest-rated show only landed at 103rd for the week.
Fox also topped ABC’s The View for the week in its 11 a.m. timeslot ,as The Faulkner Focus just edged it out in the ratings. The View has long been the most-watched daytime talk show.
