Trump beats Clinton in TV ratings
Donald Trump pulled off the upset—at least in television popularity.
Hillary Clinton’s acceptance speech at the Democratic National Convention was seen by 29.8 million people on the commercial networks, the Nielsen company said Friday. That fell short of the 32.2 million people who watched Trump speak to the Republicans a week before.
Trump, who used to carefully watch television ratings during his days as star of The Apprentice, immediately boasted about the victory during a campaign appearance Friday in Colorado Springs, Colorado.
“We beat her by millions on television. Millions!” he said. “Honestly, the numbers were incredible.”
Although Trump has been a proven ratings draw throughout his campaign, the Democratic convention had proven more popular with viewers than the Republicans for its first three nights. Stars like Alicia Keys, Katy Perry, Lenny Kravitz and Paul Simon performed for the Democrats. Those are just the celebrities who performed in the convention.
Tony Goldwin, who plays President Fitzgerald Grant on Scandal, appeared for two days in the convention. Others who spoke for Clinton were 19-year-old Chloe Moretz, second generation immigrant America Ferrera, rape survivor Lena Dunham and Elizabeth Banks, among others.
Morgan Freeman’s voice also made a special appearance as he voiced a video presentation about Clinton.
President Barack Obama, first lady Michelle Obama and former President Bill Clinton showed off their oratorical skills, too.
Meanwhile, star power was much dimmer at the Republican meeting—although it did have Scott Baio, a former Hollywood teen icon; Calvin Klein model and actor Antonio Sabato Jr., Willie Robertson of the popular American reality show Duck Dynasty and Kimberlin Brown of The Young and the
Restless, one of the longest lasting soap operas in the US. One night, the convention even ended 15 minutes earlier than planned, leaving television networks scrambling to fill time. But viewers turned up to hear Trump: his speech was watched by nine million more people than it was for any other night of the Republican convention, Nielsen said. Meanwhile, the Democrats actually had slightly more viewers for the first night of its convention than it did for the nominee’s speech, typically the highest-rated night of convention coverage.
Four years ago, the audience for Obama’s acceptance speech was 35.7 million, while 30.2 million saw Republican challenger Mitt Romney.
PBS said its viewership for Clinton’s speech was 3.91 million people, and 2.75 million the week earlier for Trump.
Fox News Channel went from first to worst during a tumultuous two weeks that included the resignation of its chief executive, Roger Ailes, on the day Trump spoke. An estimated 9.4 million people watched Trump on Fox, the most popular network for Republicans, and Fox took out newspaper ads touting its first-place finish among those covering the convention.
Just over three million people watched Clinton on Fox. Perhaps sensing its audience’s level of interest, Fox showed fewer live events from the convention floor than its rivals, preferring discussions hosted by anchors Bill O’Reilly and Megyn Kelly. Sean Hannity was brought in for analysis immediately after the convention closed each night.
Meanwhile, it was a coup for CNN, whose 7.51 million viewers topped all of the networks Thursday by a comfortable margin. This convention marked the first time the cable network beat the broadcasters in headto-head competition. The relatively newsy events appeared to benefit the networks that followed them throughout the prime time hours, as opposed to ABC, CBS and NBC.