GOP Debate Without Trump Draws 12.5 Million Viewers

The Fox News Republican debate without Donald Trump on Jan 28 drew 12.5 million viewers, according to Nielsen. The number will probably be interpreted in different ways.

From one perspective, it is the second-lowest viewership figure of the seven Republican debates, next to Fox Business’s mid-January debate, which attracted 11.1 million viewers (and, like the others, had Trump front and center). The figure fell off sharply from December’s CNN debate, which had more than 18 million viewers.

On the other hand, Trump’s absence did not produce the big drop-off in viewers from other recent debates that Trump had suggested would happen. In a somewhat drastic overstatement, Trump’s campaign manager, Corey Lewandowski, had said the ratings number for the Fox News debate, without Trump, would drop to “one to two million people.” The debate easily beat the competition on CNN and MSNBC. The two cable channels together had about 2.8 million viewers between 9 and 11 p.m., nearly 10 million fewer than Fox News. The networks provided live coverage of Trump’s competing event in Iowa — an appearance honoring and raising money for veterans — for about 15 minutes before moving on to round-table discussions and analysis. During Trump’s event, which took place roughly from 9:15 to 10:15 p.m., CNN attracted about 2 million people, while MSNBC had about 1.4 million. The debate had about 12.8 million viewers during that time block.