MSNBC’s Ratings Continue To Decline, FOX Returns To Top Spot In Cable News For 13 Straight Weeks

According to the most recent Nielsen ratings, MSNBC’s audience fell last week possible due to its intense reporting of Rep. Liz Cheney’s (R-WY) leadership vote and the Republican Party’s “civil war.”

Last week, only one MSNBC show, “The Rachel Maddow Show,” made it into the top five basic cable shows, ranking in at number four.

Fox News has the remaining top five shows: “Tucker Carlson Tonight,” “The Five,” “Hannity,” and “The Ingraham Angle.”

Despite finishing the week of May 10 as basic cable’s number two network, MSNBC’s prime time ratings fell by 15,000 viewers, and its all-day viewing fell by 17,000 viewers relative to the previous week. The left-wing network has lost 8,000 viewers aged 25 to 54, a demographic that advertisers target for its disposable income.

Ratings-hungry CNN increased by just 1%, putting it in fourth spot on basic cable behind Fox News, MSNBC, and HGTV, the house repairs and real estate network.

Meanwhile, Fox News Channel maintained its fleeting dominance in cable news, although in a better role than the previous week.

Fox has been the top-rated cable news network for the last 13 weeks, since its 19-year run as the top-rated cable news network came to an end on January 6.

According to Adweek’s TV Newser, Fox News’ prime time viewership increased from 2.2 million to 2.3 million last week.

Last week, FNC increased its hold on the 25-54 audience to 369,000 viewers, up from 343,000 the week before.

The most successful show on cable, “Tucker Carlson Tonight,” grew to 3.2 million viewers. This is an increase of 300,000 people from the prior week, with 62,000 in the most desirable population.

Although MSNBC and CNN continued to focus on the Cheney drama and news from the January 6 Capitol riots, Tucker Carlson reported on immigration — a topic on which 43 percent of Americans believe the media has not spent enough time covering, according to a recent Pew Research Center poll — as well as President Joe Biden’s stumbling economy, the return of gas lines, and parents outraged by sexually expelled children.

Last week, the late-night Fox News comedy-commentary program “Gutfeld” beat out network “comedies” like “The Tonight Show starring Jimmy Fallon” and “Jimmy Kimmel Live!” with 1.6 million viewers — more than network “comedies” like “The Tonight Show starring Jimmy Fallon” and “Jimmy Kimmel Live!”

Fox News’ winning run extended through the weekend, and CNN’s “Reliable Sources” with Brian Stelter drawing fewer than half the audience on Fox News’ “MediaBuzz,” a show about media bias.

“Chubby Checker’s 1963 hit ‘How Low Can You Go?’ was about limbo, but it could easily double as Stelter’s theme music these days,” remarked a clearly pleased Fox News.

MSNBC made a comeback on Monday, winning the 4 p.m. (Eastern) time slot of Nicolle Wallace’s “Deadline: White House,” but Fox dominated every cable match-up of the day.

After President Donald Trump left office, all cable news shows’ ratings have plummeted, but MSNBC and CNN have been particularly hard hit.

In the June issue of Vanity Fair, Joe Pompeo writes, “Bit by bit, the Trump gold rush slowed to a trickle, and people began to break their cable news addictions.” “After all, there were plenty of other things to watch.”

“The left-leaning networks will have to rely on politicians making the occasional gaffe and just get used to the post-Trump slump,” Pompeo writes, citing a Variety magazine review.