CNN’s prime-time ratings plunged 26 percent in April, compared to 2018. MSNBC’s ratings fell 14 percent compared to last year.
For the record, the report from special counsel Robert Mueller, which cleared President Trump of allegations he and his campaign colluded with Russia to alter the 2016 election, came out April 18.
The two liberal networks have been hyping the Russia collusion story for more than two years. Mueller’s exhaustive report said there was no proof of collusion or obstruction of justice, putting a dagger through the heart of that story.
According to Nielsen Media Research’s ratings, CNN suffered its lowest-rated month in viewers since October 2015. CNN had just 767,000 average primetime viewers, down from 1.04 million in April 2018. “In the 25- to 54-year-old demographic that advertisers covet most, it was the network’s least-watched month since Aug. 2015,” The Hill reported.
In prime time, Fox News beat CNN and MSNBC for the 208th month in a row. MNSBC had double the viewership of CNN — and Fox News tripled CNN total viewers.
While the collusion story is all but dead, CNN and MSNBC have simply moved on to hype the next conspiracy theory. On Tuesday, reports emerged that Mueller reportedly told Attorney General William Barr that his summary “did not fully capture the context, nature, and substance” of the work the special counsel’s office performed.
“CNN gave the Mueller letter wall-to-wall coverage during primetime and MSNBC dedicated the vast majority of their programming to it as well,” Fox News reported. “Only MSNBC’s Rachel Maddow managed to dedicate a segment on the chaotic power struggle in Venezuela between the two liberal cable news networks on Tuesday night.
CNN chief legal analyst Jeffrey Toobin blasted Barr for “distort[ing]” and “shap[ing] the public perception of the Mueller Report forever” and said he could tell that “Mueller was pissed.”
CNN anchors Chris Cuomo and Don Lemon piled on the attorney general during their handoff. Cuomo called Barr and “agent” for President Trump instead of the American people while Lemon called him a “political hack” and a “mercenary for the president.”
“You don’t have to be a lawyer to see when someone is trying to pull the wool over your eyes,” Lemon told Cuomo. “You don’t have to be a lawyer to understand how William Barr got this job, how he auditioned for it, how he conducted himself during the hearings, and how he conducted himself at the press initial press conference with the letter and the second press conference.”
