As President Donald Trump continues to rail against Fox News and nudges his supporters toward its competitors, MSNBC’s “Morning Joe” beat out rival Fox News morning show “Fox & Friends” for the first time in almost 20 years.
The ratings: “Morning Joe’s” total viewership surpassed “Fox & Friends'” last week, something which hasn’t happened since 2001, The Wrap reported.
- The MSNBC program averaged 1.62 million total viewers from Monday to Friday, as compared to “Fox & Friends'” 1.38 million total viewers, according to Nielsen ratings.
- MSNBC’s “dayside” programming beat out Fox News’ by 120,000 total viewers.
- The Daily Beast’s Justin Baragona noted that “Morning Joe” topped “Fox & Friends” in total viewership on Tuesday as well.
“This is becoming the norm and not the exception,” Baragona tweeted.
The controversy: While Trump has been critical of Fox News in the past, a series of recent coverage decisions at the network appear to have intensified the president’s ire and prompted him to urge viewers to tune into Newsmax and One America News.
- Trump and his supporters have slammed the network for what they perceive as a failure to refute biased criticism against the president, particularly with regard to alleged widespread voter fraud in the 2020 election.
- The president and his supporters were outraged after Fox News called Arizona for Joe Biden on election night well before most other networks.
- Trump supporters were similarly incensed when Fox News cut away from a Nov. 9 press conference held by Kayleigh McEnany, during which the White House Press Secretary accused Democrats of welcoming “voter fraud” and “illegal voting.”
Trump’s revenge? Axios reported last week that Trump is considering starting his own digital media empire to “wreck” Fox News.
- Fox News “daytime ratings have completely collapsed. Weekend daytime even WORSE,” Trump tweeted last week.
- “Very sad to watch this happen, but they forgot what made them successful, what got them there. They forgot the Golden Goose,” he added.
