CNN’s primetime special with first lady Jill Biden on Monday night did not attract high viewership. CNN has not had a permanent 9 p.m. ET host for more than a year following Chris Cuomo being fired from his position.
In the past year, Jake Tapper and other hosts have had a hard time attracting an audience during that primetime hour. First lady Jill Biden who had a “CNN Primetime” special called “Jill Biden Abroad,” faced a similar problem of struggling to win the viewers’ attention. The special featured an interview with CNN White House correspondent Arlette Saenz in which she held 43 percent of CNN’s average 2023 9 p.m. ET viewership.
The Special had around 368,000 total viewers, while Fox News’ Hannity had 2.7 million and MSNBC’s “The Rachel Maddow Show,” had 2.3 million views. Both of these were aired at that exact time slot. The Jill Biden special was CNN’s worst weekday performance since June 17, 2022, for that time slot, with the exception of Christmas Eve, Thanksgiving, Black Friday, and Martin Luther King Jr. Day.
What’s more, CNN’s “Jill Biden Abroad” also failed to perform well with the advertiser-coveted demographic of adults aged 25-54, where they only averaged around 84,000 viewers. This meant that the network’s key category lost 42% of the network’s 2023 year-to-date average 9 p.m. viewership.
Meanwhile “Hannity” averaged 322,000 demo viewers and “Maddow” had around 219,000 during that day and time.
