Last updated on April 11th, 2018 at 12:29 pm
MSNBC’s coverage of the Chris Christie scandal has powered Chris Matthews, Rachel Maddow and Lawrence O’Donnell all to wins over Fox News with younger viewers age 25-54.
According to TVNewser, Monday was a very good night for MSNBC, “It was also a good night for MSNBC, which continued its coverage of the Chris Christie scandal throughout primetime. The network won in the demo at 7pmET, 9pmET and 10pmET. “Hardball with Chris Matthews” beat “On the Record with Greta Van Susteren” by +31,000 A25-54 viewers. Rachel Maddow’s program beat Megyn Kelly’s by +100,000 demo viewers, and “The Last Word” beat “Hannity” by +82,000.”
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The only time slot that Fox won was at 8 PM, where Bill O’Reilly saw his audience swell to nearly double its normal size, because he was airing part two of his interview with President Obama. Fox News’ struggles to draw younger viewers have been well documented, but the cable news leader almost lost an entire night to MSNBC. If it wasn’t for Barack Obama, Fox might have been totally screwed.
MSNBC has been riding a wave of great ratings with younger viewers, while Fox has struggled because the Chris Christie scandal remains the story that shall not be discussed on the cable news leader. Everything that Fox News has tried to attract younger viewers has completely failed. Megyn Kelly isn’t bringing in the younger viewers, and in fact she has been on the losing end often during her battle for the coveted 25-54 demo with Rachel Maddow.
Fox News continues to have the oldest audience on television, which never bodes well for any television network in the long term. For now, Fox and their viewers can take comfort in the fact that they are the top rated cable news network by a huge margin. The problem is that there are demographic storm clouds on the horizon.
If MSNBC can beat Fox among younger viewers, the possibility is there for the Lean Forward network to eventually take over the top spot in terms of total viewers. Before Fox News came along, nobody thought that CNN’s empire could fall. Fox is in a good position for years to come, but they have serious problems. If they don’t fix these issues soon, Fox may join CNN in the dust heap of former cable news powers.
Jason is the managing editor. He is also a White House Press Pool and a Congressional correspondent for PoliticusUSA. Jason has a Bachelor’s Degree in Political Science. His graduate work focused on public policy, with a specialization in social reform movements.
Awards and Professional Memberships
Member of the Society of Professional Journalists and The American Political Science Association
