“The Rachel Maddow Show” was the most-watched cable news show in the key demographic of adults age 25-54 among the 9 p.m. ET timeslot for the second-straight week following Tuesday’s record-setting episode, when she revealed President Trump’s 2005 tax return.
For the week of March 13, Maddow averaged 756,000 demo viewers, while Fox News averaged 604,000 and CNN picked up 420,000. It was Maddow’s best week among demo viewers since Oct. 27, 2008.
Fox News edged Maddow among total viewers, averaging 2.94 million compared to 2.91 million. CNN finished a distant third with an average of 1.2 million viewers. Despite losing to Fox News’ “Tucker Carlson Tonight” in the category, Maddow had her best week ever among total viewers.
The White House said Maddow was “desperate for ratings” when she released Trump’s 2005 tax return. Whatever the motives, she definitely scored viewers — the Trump tax return earned Maddow her best ratings ever.
Maddow hauled in 4.1 million total viewers during the historic episode, despite disappointing many viewers. Her previous high-water mark was January 10, 2017’s 3.2 million overall audience members, which means the tax return episode eclipsed that by 28.1 percent.
In the demo, “The Rachel Maddow Show” landed 1.4 million viewers. That beat her previous demo record (October 29, 2008) by an average of 100,000 adults. Last Tuesday was also MSNBC’s second-most-watched regularly scheduled show of all time — an episode of “Countdown with Keith Olbermann” on Oct. 29, 2008 averaged 4.2 million total viewers.