In the week since President-elect Donald Trump’s decisive 2024 election victory, CNN and MSNBC have seen their ratings plummet as both left-leaning cable news channels brace for possible future changes.
Multiple on-air personalities from both channels reacted to the election outcome with what critics described as “meltdowns.”
“Major Nielsen ratings plunge at MSNBC since Trump won, practically every day since,” FOX Business’ Elizabeth MacDonald wrote on X (formerly Twitter) Monday night.
MacDonald cited the ratings change for several of MSNBC’s most well-known shows from October 30 – six days before Election Day – to Friday, November 8, three days after Trump’s win over failed Democratic presidential nominee Kamala Harris.
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In this timespan, “The 11th Hour with Stephanie Ruhle,” which airs at 11:00 pm ET, appeared to have suffered the most, declining by two-thirds (67%) in ratings.
The show in the 10:00 pm ET spot, “The Last Word with Lawrence O’Donnell,” was down 60.6% in Nielsen’s ratings.
MSNBC’s 7:00 show “The ReidOut With Joy Reid” experienced the third-greatest decline at 54.6%.
Major Nielsen ratings plunge at MSNBC since Trump won, practically every day since. Just one example – 10/30 Wednesday vs Fri 11/8 –
Morning Joe 1st hour – down 39.6%
Morning Joe 2d hour – down 36.9%
Andrea Mitchell – down 39.7%
Ari Melber – down 49.6%
Joy Reid’s Reidout – down…— Elizabeth MacDonald (@LizMacDonaldFOX) November 12, 2024
Reid in particular is known for making controversial remarks that have widely been characterized as racist or racially charged. During MSNBC’s election night coverage, she appeared to blame white women for Harris’ loss of the battleground state of North Carolina.
Other flagship MSNBC programs, including “Alex Wagner Tonight,” “All In With Chris Hayes,” “The Beat With Ari Melber,” “Andrea Mitchell Reports,” and “Morning Joe,” all considerably declined in ratings from October 30 to November 8.
According to Forbes, Nielsen ratings keep “track of who and how many people are watching programs” on television.
Conservative YouTuber Benny Johnson noted on X Tuesday morning: “On Election Night, 25% of cable networks’ usual viewers chose not to watch — instead tuning into independent creators’ record-breaking streams like ours.”
“Trump isn’t even in office yet is already defeating the fake news,” Johnson added. “The Golden Age of media.”
On Tuesday, The Daily Mail reported that MSNBC’s post-election “nosedive” in ratings “comes as commentators and analysts continue to discuss the result – often with rants laced with ire toward the conservative.”
The Mail noted that on Thursday, two days after Election Day, right-leaning FOX News measured 2.6 million viewers – more than four times as many viewers as the 596,000 who tuned in to MSNBC the same day.
However, MSNBC’s dismal total still beat out CNN, which had garnered an audience of only 419,000 – less than a sixth of FOX’s audience – on the Thursday following the election.
On election night, the disparities between FOX and the two left-leaning channels were less pronounced. FOX had 10.3 million viewers that night compared to MSNBC’s 6 million and CNN’s 5.1 million.
On Tuesday, the media company Puck reported that CNN is bracing for a series of mass layoffs, which Puck described as “the culling of hundreds of jobs.”
“Many of CNN’s own journalists, plenty of whom were blinded by Trump’s significant victory, have evinced similar naiveté about their own fates,” Puck added. “Some of the on-air talent are also likely to be affected.”
The New York Post indicated that CNN CEO Mark Thompson
may also demand deep cuts to the massive salaries raked in by its struggling primetime stable of anchors, which include Anderson Cooper, Erin Burnett and Kaitlan Collins.
Cooper, who anchored the Election night coverage, rakes in an annual salary reported to be as high as $20 million. Burnett makes about $6 million and Collins takes home a more budget-friendly $3 million.
The London-born Thompson is Catholic.
On October 31, the Post reported that MSNBC’s parent company, Comcast, “is exploring spinning off its struggling cable networks business,” including the “progressive” cable news channel.
The Post noted that Comcast President and NBCUniversal interim CEO Michael J. Cavanagh
revealed during the third-quarters earnings call that the media giant is mulling the creation of a “new, well-capitalized company owned by our shareholders and comprised of our our strong portfolio of cable networks.”
The cable networks include MSNBC, CNBC, Bravo, E!, Syfy, USA Network and Oxygen True Crime.
LifeNews Note: Joshua Mercer writes for CatholicVote, where this column originally appeared.
