Fox News Channel’s behind-the-scenes turmoil hasn’t slowed down the ratings juggernaut, as FNC finished April as the most-watched channel in all of cable.
Fox News averaged 2.4 million primetime viewers to finish atop the category for the third straight month. TNT’s NBA-playoff heavy schedule finished second, averaging 1.8 million viewers between 8-11 p.m. MSNBC, HGTV and ESPN round out the top five.
Among total day viewers, Fox News also finished No. 1 for the tenth straight month, averaging 1.5 million viewers compared to 1.1 million for second place Nickelodeon. No other cable networks surpassed the one-million viewer average for the month as HGTV MSNBC, and TNT round out the top five.
April marks the 184-straight month that Fox News has beaten cable news rivals CNN and MSNBC. April was quite a month for Fox News, as the network parted ways with its biggest star, Bill O’Reilly, and co-president Bill Shine amid on-going sexual harassment allegations.
The month also saw major changes to the network’s programming. “Tucker Carlson Tonight” moved from 9 p.m. ET to 8 p.m. ET to replace “The O’Reilly Factor,” while “The Five” moved to 9 p.m. A new one-hour, political talk show called “The Fox News Specialists” moved into the 5 p.m. ET timeslot.
The shakeup atop Fox News hasn’t turned away viewers. The network grew 36 percent among total day viewers compared to April of 2016, which was well before former anchor Gretchen Carlson came forward with sexual harassment allegations against founding CEO Roger Ailes.
A variety of women came forward with similar claims and Ailes eventually stepped down in disgrace. O’Reilly and Shine are also gone because of the on-going scandal, but it should ne noted that Shine was never accused of harassment himself. All three men deny all allegations made against them.
The company announced Monday that current Fox News executives Suzanne Scott was promoted to president of programming and Jay Wallace to president of news.
It will be interesting to see if the new regime can keep Fox News’ streak going for another month.