Ratings at the left-leaning MSNBC cable network continue to fall, according to the New York Times, which describes the decline as "one of the deepest skids in its history."
Even the network's star, Rachel Maddow, has seen viewership drop, marking her lowest quarterly ratings since she began, the Times noted.
While Ronan Farrow's afternoon show has consistently failed to gain traction, even with much promotion, well-known programming like "Morning Joe" has also dipped, scoring its "second-lowest quarterly ratings,"
according to the Times.
“This has been a tough year all around,” Phil Griffin, MSNBC's president told the Times in noting his network wasn't alone in marking a tough quarter. “All three cable news channels are drawing a smaller combined audience than they were five years ago.”
Griffin also pointed to a national political weariness as pervasive gridlock in Washington has angered many across the country. “You can look at the dysfunction in Washington, the wariness about politics, the low approval ratings,” Griffin added to the Times. “That’s had an impact. But we’ve got to adjust; we’ve got to evolve.”
Ratings at competitor networks that produce similar political coverage, however, have not seen such a drop-off.
After reconfiguring its programming line-up, Fox News has shown dominance, rising to land "among the top five highest-rated networks 96 percent of the time,"
the Daily Caller noted, citing data from Nielsen Media Research.
Fox News's new prime time star, Megyn Kelly, has also owned her 9 p.m. time slot, averaging 2.5 million nightly viewers over the past year and rising 36 percent in total viewers over the last quarter, the Daily caller noted.
But
the Associated Press noted that Fox's network dropped 29 percent over last year's ratings for the fall prime time television lineup, even as CBS, NBC and ABC had all seen fall lineup increases in prime time viewing.
Last week's ratings showed that ESPN reigned as the most popular cable network with 3.75 million prime time viewers, followed by TBS (3.12 million) the Disney Channel (1.88 million), USA (1.8 million) and Fox News (1.69 million), the AP noted. The evening newscast leaders were ABC's "World News" followed by NBC's "Nightly News" and then "CBS Evening News."
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