Trump Mocks CNN, MSNBC Ratings Drop Following Mueller Report Submission

Published: 3/29/2019, 9:26:01 AM EDT

Trump Mocks CNN, MSNBC Ratings Drop Following Mueller Report Submission — Television host Rachel Maddow at the State Department in Washington on March 14, 2012. (Brendan Hoffman/Getty Images)

President Donald Trump said that he noticed how ratings for CNN and MSNBC have dropped since the submission of Special Counsel Robert Mueller's report, which could not establish a link between his campaign and Russia.

“Wow, ratings for ‘Morning Joe,’ which were really bad in the first place, just ‘tanked’ with the release of the Mueller Report,” Trump said on Twitter. “Likewise, other shows on MSNBC and CNN have gone down by as much as 50 percent.”

"Just shows, Fake News never wins!"

Rachel Maddow, the most popular non-Fox News host in the nation, and a huge proponent of the theory that Trump colluded with Russia to win the presidency, saw a drop in her ratings on March 25, as did fellow MSNBC host Chris Hayes. Ratings on openly anti-Trump CNN also dropped.

Sean Hannity of Fox News at the Conservative Political Action Conference (CPAC) in National Harbor, Md., on March 4, 2016. (Carolyn Kaster/AP Photo, File) — Sean Hannity of Fox News at the Conservative Political Action Conference (CPAC) in National Harbor, Md., on March 4, 2016. Carolyn Kaster/AP Photo, File

While over 4 million viewers, including 728,000 in the 25-54 demographic, watched Fox’s Sean Hannity in the 9 p.m. hour that night, Maddow drew only 2.5 million viewers. Hannity's audience was up by 32 percent from his average while Maddow's was a drop of nearly 500,000, or 19 percent below her average, compared with the previous Monday.

CNN’s Chris Cuomo, brother of New York Democratic Gov. Andrew Cuomo, brought in just 911,000.

At the 8 p.m. hour, Fox’s Tucker Carlson was watched by 3.8 million, with 717,000 in the 25-54 demographic, versus MSNBC’s Hayes (1.5 million, 244,000 in demographic) and CNN’s Anderson Cooper (795,000, 212,000 in demographic).

On Tuesday, Maddow's audience dropped further, down to 2.3 million viewers, while Hannity's dipped to 3.57 million.

Maddow hasn't directly addressed the rating dip but employees at both MSNBC and CNN have struggled to respond to the report's submission after frequently pushing the theory despite scant evidence to support it.

On MSNBC, "Morning Joe" host Joe Scarborough lashed out at critics on Wednesday morning, claiming his network refused to "suck up to Donald Trump" like the critics are.

"Just because you are corrupt, just because you’re not a journalist, just because you have sold your soul to a personality cult, don’t knock reporters at The New York Times or the Washington Post or The Wall Street Journal or the broadcast networks for doing their job right," he said. "Save your breath, we’re not going to divert our eyes. Damn the torpedos, full steam ahead, follow the story where it leads us."

At CNN, media host Brian Stelter claimed in his newsletter that the drop in ratings for MSNBC and CNN was because "there hasn't been much news."

Joe Concha, a media reporter for The Hill, said in a segment on Fox that the assertation was not correct.

“Yesterday, CNN didn’t even average more than 540,000 viewers as a 40-year-old network with a big brand name and a crazy news cycle,” Concha said.

“You’re talking about [Jussie] Smollett getting released, [Michael] Avenatti getting arrested, the Mueller report — how anybody isn’t rising in ratings in this particular week when it’s just been nuts."

"That’s almost impossible to do unless your viewers don’t trust you anymore based on all the speculation you did recklessly and randomly over the past two years," he added.

Trump addressed the issue again in another tweet, saying: "The Fake News Media is going Crazy!"

"They are suffering a major 'breakdown,' have ZERO credibility or respect, & must be thinking about going legit," he said. "I have learned to live with Fake News, which has never been more corrupt than it is right now. Someday, I will tell you the secret!"