UPDATE: Nielsen’s full measurement of Tuesday night’s presidential debate between vice president Kamala Harris and former president Donald Trump was strong, with 67.135 million viewers tuning in via multiple networks — led by ABC News, which handled the debate. That number was up 31% from the 51.266 million who tuned in to Trump’s debate with president Joe Biden (from CNN) in June, before the latter dropped out to endorse Harris.
Tuesday’s total accounts for telecasts across ABC, CBS, FOX, NBC, Merit Street, Scripps News, Telemundo, Univision, BET, CNN, CNN en Español, Fox News Channel, Fox Business, MSNBC, Newsmax, NewsNation and PBS.
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Disney’s dispute with DirecTV — which has kept ABC and its other networks blacked out on the satellite service — didn’t appear to have a major impact on the Alphabet net’s numbers, as ABC News won the night with 19.049 million viewers — making it the most-watched debate on any network in at least 16 years, according to Disney research.
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Meanwhile, Disney’s ABC News Live outlet on streaming and digital platforms (including Hulu, Disney+ and the ABC Owned Television Stations apps) totaled 7.4 million viewers so far, which gave Disney a total combined delivery of 26.4 million viewers across linear and streaming. Per the company’s research, it was the most-viewed live event by hours streamed on Disney+ in the U.S. to date, and ABC’s most-viewed live multiplatform event of the year.
The big ratings come as ABC News moderators David Muir and Linsey Davis earned high marks for their performance on Tuesday night, which included quick fact checks of Trump’s blatant lies.
In a statement, Debra OConnell, the president of news group and networks at Disney Entertainment, said she and ABC News prexy Almin Karamehmedovic were “immensely proud to have delivered a tough but fair debate that merited the incredible numbers we’re seeing today. Presidential debates are a cornerstone of our democracy, and the journalists of ABC News met this moment with the professionalism and integrity that viewers expect and deserve.”
Tuesday’s debate ratings follows strong viewership for the Democratic National Convention in August, which peaked with 26.2 million average viewers on its final night, when Harris spoke, compared to 24.5 million on the night of Trump’s address at July’s Republican National Convention.
The debate, which took place at Philadelphia’s National Constitution Center, was also a major topic of conversation across social media.
Among the most-talked-about moments was Trump’s reference to a debunked rumor about Haitian immigrants in Ohio: “They’re eating the dogs,” he said. “The people that came in — they’re eating the cats. They’re eating the pets of the people that live there.” Muir and Linsey stepped in multiple times to fact-check the former president — assuaging a major criticism of the moderation of CNN’s Trump-Biden Debate — including to point out that Springfield’s city manager has said there were “no credible reports” backing up the pet rumor.
Meanwhile, in pre-debate programming, ABC’s “Race for the White House” averaged 7.587 million viewers, followed by Fox News Channel’s “Fox News Democracy” 5.731 million and NBC’s “NBC News Presidential Debate Countdown” (4.322 million). In post-debate programming, ABC’s “Post Debate Analysis” averaged 13.622 million then Fox News Channel’s “ABC Presidential Debate/Analysis” (8.412 million) and NBC’s “NBC News Presidential Debate Countdown” (7.221 million).
More to come…
