A week after the highly anticipated report from Special Counsel Robert Mueller was released, MSNBC star Rachel Maddow has seen her ratings dropped by more than almost 20 percent.
Since President Donald Trump took office, Maddow’s show experienced a ratings boost, and she offered extensive coverage of Mueller’s investigation into whether Russia influenced the 2016 election. This year, according to The Associated Press, her ratings have slightly edged out Fox News pundit Sean Hannity’s show, which has the same time slot.
“The Rachel Maddow Show” had an average 13 percent decrease in viewers since last week’s Mueller’s report found that President Trump did not collude with Moscow, reported Fox News. The decrease in ratings was from Monday to Wednesday of this week compared with last week.
On Monday, March 25, Maddow’s audience dropped about 19 percent to 2.5 million, reported AP, citing Nielsen data. The next day, on March 26, her audience dropped to 2.3 million.
MSNBC’s primetime news lineup averaged 2.46 million viewers for this week compared with the 2.83 million from last week, Fox reported.
“For four days, Fox News’ primetime lineup has seen distinct rises in the average number of viewers tuning in, while rivals MSNBC and CNN have seen drops,” Variety’s Brian Steinberg reported. He was referring to Monday through Thursday’s shows.
Maddow has been the most visible television personality taking on Trump during Mueller’s probe, her reports are methodical and detailed. As a result, she’s a target of Trump supporters seeking vindication. The New York Post compiled a mock “Mueller Madness” bracket of Trump critics with Maddow the top-seeded cable news figure, and the chart was retweeted Wednesday by White House Press Secretary Sarah Sanders.
It’s yet to be seen if Maddow can recapture the ratings she saw several months ago.
In January 2019, she had the largest audience in cable news, getting 3.29 million average views. Hannity had 3.04 million, noted Variety. In February, she had 3.07 million while Hannity had 3.17 million viewers.
President Donald Trump made note of MSNBC’s rating slump on March 28.
“Wow, ratings for ‘Morning Joe,’ which were really bad in the first place, just ‘tanked’ with the release of the Mueller Report. “Likewise, other shows on MSNBC and CNN have gone down by as much as 50%. Just shows, Fake News never wins!” Trump tweeted.