More people watched the guilty verdicts in former President Donald Trump’s porn-star hush-money election-interference trial on Fox News Channel than any other cable or broadcast outlet.
According to early data Nielsen provided by Fox News, the network had more than 4.4 million viewers tuned in during the 5 p.m. (ET) hour, when the jury’s decision was read in court. Later reporting had Fox at 4.7 million viewers on average in that hour.
MSNBC had 3.4 million viewers and CNN had nearly 2.4 million viewers. The New York Times reported on Friday that, from 8 to 11 p.m., MSNBC programs averaged 3.4 million viewers, topping Fox News’s 3.1 million, while CNN averaged 1.3 million.
The verdict generated the highest-rated hour in cable.
On broadcast, from just before 5 p.m., when the networks broke into regular programming because verdicts had been reached, ABC News had 3.3 million viewers for 102 minutes of coverage and CBS News had 2.5 million viewers tune in for 71 minutes of coverage.
Viewing data on NBC viewership was not available.
Fox News Media’s digital properties notched triple- and double-digit increases versus their 2024 weekday average and delivered their highest level of engagement of the year, according to Adobe Analytics.
Fox News Go streaming video starts were up 240%, unique viewers were up 301% and total view time was up 64% versus the average 2024 weekday.
