Cable news ratings up 72 per cent over 2019

NEW YORK — It's not difficult to figure out which television networks are benefiting from the presidential election, and which ones should worry about next year.

Collectively, the news networks CNN, Fox News Channel and MSNBC averaged just under 10 million viewers in prime time last week, or 72 per cent more than the same week in 2019, the Nielsen company said.

At a time most networks are grateful not to lose too many viewers year-to-year, Fox News' average of 4.42 million last week was up 63 per cent, MSNBC's 2.75 million was up 38 per cent and CNN's 2.59 million represented an eye-popping 172 per cent increase.

Gravity usually has a way of dealing with what goes up, and there's concern about what will happen to the news networks when the election is over. That's especially the case if the more conventional candidate, Democrat Joe Biden, beats President Donald Trump.

The vice-presidential debate between Mike Pence and Kamala Harris dominated the news last week, with the most people watching it on Fox News.

CBS won the week in prime time among the broadcast networks, averaging 5.8 million viewers. ABC had 5.7 million, NBC had 4.9 million, Fox had 4.3 million, Univision had 1.14 million, Telemundo had 1.06 million and Ion Television had 1.04 million.

After the cable news trio, TBS averaged 2.36 million and ESPN had 1.93 million.

ABC's “World News Tonight” won the evening news ratings race, averaging 8.2 million viewers. NBC's “Nightly News” had 7.3 million and the “CBS Evening News” had 5.3 million.

For the week of Oct. 5-11, the top 20 programs their networks and viewerships:

1. NFL Football: Tampa Bay at Chicago, Fox, 15.12 million.

2. NFL Football: Minnesota at Seattle, NBC, 15.08 million.

3. NFL Football: New England at Kansas City, CBS, 14.7 million.

4. “60 Minutes,” CBS, 12.04 million.

5. “Vice-Presidential Debate,” Fox News, 11.94 million.

6. “Vice-Presidential Debate,” ABC, 9.85 million.

7. “NFL Pregame,” NBC, 9.5 million.

8. “Vice-Presidential Debate Analysis,” Fox News, 9.19 million.

9. NFL Football: Atlanta at Green Bay, ESPN, 9.04 million.

10. NBA Finals: Miami vs. L.A. Lakers (Friday), ABC, 8.89 million.

11. “NFL Pregame,” Fox, 8.64 million.

12. “Vice-Presidential Debate Preview,” Fox News, 8.42 million.

13. NBA Finals: L.A. Lakers vs. Miami (Sunday), ABC, 8.29 million.

14. “Vice-Presidential Debate,” CNN, 7.75 million.

15. NBA Finals: L.A. Lakers vs. Miami (Tuesday), ABC, 7.62 million.

16. “Football Night in America,” NBC, 7.39 million.

17. “Vice-Presidential Debate Analysis,” ABC, 7.01 million.

18. “Vice-Presidential Debate,” MSNBC, 6.94 million.

19. “Biden Town Hall,” NBC, 6.7 million.

20. “Vice-Presidential Debate Analysis,” MSNBC, 6.65 million.

David Bauder, The Associated Press