Donald Trump’s reported affairs aren’t good for his marriage or the country, but they’re great for cable news ratings.
On Thursday, Anderson Cooper welcomed former Playmate Karen McDougal to “AC 360,” where the two discussed the affair she says she had with President Trump. As a result of the exclusive booking, Cooper’s overall viewership from 8 p.m. to 9 p.m. ET soared 89 percent compared with his average audience from prior last four weeks. His Nielsen rating in the key adults 25-54 demo jumped 55 percent.
The following hour rose even more, growing a whopping 113 percent and 81 percent, respectively.
The interview with McDougal technically ran from 8:15-9:30. Isolating those 75 minutes of the two-hour telecast, “AC 360” averaged 688,000 demo viewers and 2.382 million audience members, marking improvements of 76 percent in the demo and 109 percent overall.
Looking at it hourly, “AC 360” hauled in 2.214 million viewers from 8-9 p.m., with 608,000 of them coming in the main demo. That beat Tucker Carlson (and MSNBC’s Chris Hayes, who finished in third outright) head to head, though the Fox News Channel personality had the most overall eyeballs.
Cooper’s winning momentum carried into the 9 o’clock hour when he bested both MSNBC’s Rachel Maddow and Fox’s Sean Hannity in the key demo. That particular 60 minutes of “AC 360” was third in terms of total viewers, however.