Trump’s Big Fox News Return Only Does So-So in the Ratings
After a six-month absence, the ex-president did pull in 3 million viewers during his primetime chat with Hannity—but he still drew lower ratings than Fox’s other programming.
Former President Donald Trump’s six-month “soft ban” from Fox News—which he derided last month as a “RINO network”—ended on Monday night with a much-hyped interview with longtime confidant Sean Hannity. And while the friendly Trump chat represented a moderate boost over Hannity’s recent viewership, and beat the Fox host’s cable news competition at 9 p.m., the ratings-obsessed ex-president’s return to Fox airwaves still couldn’t compete with the network’s current stalwarts. According to Nielsen, the interview averaged 3.041 million total viewers and 358,000 in the key 25-54 demographic. Tucker Carlson Tonight, which airs at 8 p.m., pulled in 441,000 demo viewers and an overall audience of 3.342 million. The Five, which is the most-watched show on cable news, nabbed 741,000 more total viewers than Trump. The ex-president’s grievance-filled sitdown, meanwhile, was criticized by some Fox News personalities, who went so far as to call Trump’s attacks on likely GOP presidential opponent Ron DeSantis “absolutely horrific.”
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