In the wake of the controversial town hall attended by former President Donald Trump last week, CNN's prime-time viewership figures have continued to drop, falling below those of right-wing channel Newsmax on Friday.
The town hall itself, on May 10, attracted more than 3 million viewers. However, just two days later, CNN had an average total of 335,000 viewers between 8 p.m. and 11 p.m., against Newsmax's 357,000, according to data shared by Mediaite. That means CNN fell to fourth place in prime-time ratings for news channels, also trailing Fox News and MSNBC, which averaged a total of 1.44 million and 1.08 million viewers respectively during the same time slot.
The drop in prime-time viewership could signal that a week of outrage at CNN for the town hall attended by Trump last week has driven viewers away from the network. On May 9, the day before the town hall, CNN had 589,000 viewers between 8 p.m. and 11 p.m. On May 2, a week earlier, the figure stood at 539,000.
Commenting on the rating in a statement to Newsweek, a CNN spokesperson said that the story is more complex than simply looking at CNN's numbers.
"Fox News viewership is down double digits as their viewers jump to Newsmax. In the key P25-54 demo (viewers aged 25 to 54), CNN is up versus the previous four Fridays, while both Fox and MSNBC were down," the statement reads.
The town hall in New Hampshire, hosted by CNN anchor Kaitlan Collins, was Trump's first appearance on the news channel after the relationship between the former president and the broadcaster soured during his time in office. The town hall was strongly opposed by critics on the left of the political spectrum, who accused CNN of offering Trump a prime-time platform to spread false claims about the 2020 election.
Anger against the company was intensified after Trump was found liable for sexually abusing and defaming writer and magazine columnist E. Jean Carroll on May 9, one day before the town hall. Trump was ordered by a New York jury to pay Carroll $5 million in damages.
CNN defended its decision to hold the town hall with Trump saying that it was its duty to ask the former president "tough questions."
"President Trump is the Republican frontrunner, and our job despite his unique circumstances is to do what we do best. Ask tough questions, follow up, and hold him accountable to give voters the information they need to sort through their choices. That is our role and our responsibility," CNN told Newsweek in a written statement ahead of the event.
But critics have attacked the channel for giving Trump a platform, and called for a boycott of the network.
Friday's drop in prime-time viewership is only the latest in a series of recent setbacks suffered by the network. In March, CNN's prime-time ratings plunged by 61 percent, according to figures released by Nielsen. While other major news channels have also suffered drops in viewership compared with the previous year when Russia's invasion of Ukraine was fresh in the news—with Fox News off by 27 percent and MSNBC down by 12 percent—CNN had the steepest decline.
This comes at the same time as the company is trying to rebuild trust as a non-partisan channel after years of criticism of the broadcaster under the leadership of Chris Licht by Trump and his followers.
Licht was hired directly by the new Warner Bros. management that took over the channel about a year ago. His boss, Discovery CEO David Zaslav, didn't seem worried about the drop in viewership figures in March, saying: "Ratings be damned. Let's focus on who we are. This is our mission. This is our legacy. And this is our journey together."
Zaslav said that more partisan coverage would likely get the channel more viewers, but added "that's not what I came here to do."
Update, 5/16/23, 7:20 a.m. ET: This article was updated with previous CNN viewing figures.
Update, 5/17/23, 8:31 a.m. ET: This article was updated with comment from CNN.
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