TV Ratings: Acquittal Good For Fox News Channel

President Donald Trump's imprachment  acquittal in the U-S Senate gave the Fox News Channel best in the ratings since the weeks he was elected and inaugurated.

The Nielsen company said Fox News averaged 4.27 million viewers in prime time last week, better than any network except for ABC, which televised the Academy Awards, and CBS, reports The Associated Press.

It was the fifth most-watched week ever for Fox’s prime-time schedule, and highest since election week 2016, Nielsen said. The only other times Fox topped that mark came during two weeks in March 2003, during the Iraq War, and the August week in 2015 when the network showed the year’s first Republican debate — the first one Trump participated in.

Measuring the entire day instead of just the evening hours, it was Fox’s best week since January 2017, when Trump took office.

Led by Sean Hannity’s average of 4.9 million viewers, it was the most-watched week ever for all three of Fox’s prime-time opinion shows, Nielsen said. “Tucker Carlson Tonight” averaged 4.7 million viewers, and “The Ingraham Angle” had 4.1 million viewers.

 ABC topped the broadcasters in prime time with an average of 7.7 million viewers, despite the lowest-rated Oscars broadcast of all time. CBS averaged 4.8 million viewers, NBC had 4.1 million, Fox broadcasting had 3.2 million, Univision had 1.4 million, ION Television had 1.3 million, Telemundo had 1 million and the CW had 640,000.

⏩ Broadcast Prime-Time Top 200 Show (Total Viewers): 

1. “The Oscars,” ABC, 23.57 million.
2. “Live From the Red Carpet” (7:30 to 8 p.m. Eastern), ABC, 11.91 million.
3. “State of the Union,” Fox News, 11.68 million.
4. “State of the Union Analysis” (10:25 to 10:32 p.m. Eastern), Fox News, 11.67 million.
5. “Live From the Red Carpet” (7 to 7:30 p.m.), ABC, 9.33 million.
6. “State of the Union Preview,” Fox News, 9.3 million.
7. “Young Sheldon,” CBS, 8.99 million.
8. “Chicago Med,” NBC, 8.67 million.
9. “Chicago Fire,” NBC, 8.19 million.
10. “Democratic Presidential Debate,” ABC, 7.87 million.

11. “State of the Union Democratic Response,” Fox News, 7.65 million.
12. “The Masked Singer,” Fox, 7.46 million.
13. “State of the Union Analysis” (10:44 to 11 p.m.), Fox News, 7.21 million.
14. “Chicago PD,” NBC, 7.15 million.
15. “America’s Got Talent Champions,” NBC, 6.74 million.
16. “Hawaii Five-0,” CBS, 6.69 million.
17. “Bull,” CBS, 6.48 million.
18. “911: Lone Star,” Fox, 6.39 million.
19. “Mom,” CBS, 6.34 million.
20. “The Neighborhood,” CBS, 6.23 million

ABC’s “World News Tonight” led the evening news ratings race with an average of 9.2 million viewers. NBC’s “Nightly News” was second with 8.3 million and the “CBS Evening News” had 6.1 million.  World News Tonight posted its largest margin of victory in Total Viewers (1.3 million) since the week of May 26, 1997. The newscast won all 20 weeks of the season and the last 63 weeks overall.

After Fox News, the most popular cable networks in prime time were MSNBC with 1.59 million viewers, HGTV with 1.21 million, TLC with 1.16 million and CNN with 1.13 million. Of the 40 most-watched programs on cable television last week, 39 were on Fox News — with one lonely Rachel Maddow show on MSNBC the exception.

⏩  Basic cable ranker: Total Viewers 

⏩ Basic cable ranker: 25-54