Thread: Trump prevails over Clinton in convention speech ratings race

Trump prevails over Clinton in convention speech ratings race
by Brian Stelter
July 29, 2016: 3:10 PM ET

Trump, by a margin of two million viewers, according to unofficial ratings totals.

Clinton's Thursday night acceptance speech at the DNC averaged 28 million viewers across the six biggest cable and broadcast channels.

Trump's speech at the RNC one week earlier averaged 30 million viewers across the same channels.

For Trump, the victory is even sweeter because while the first three nights of the Democratic convention out-rated the same nights of the Republican convention, his speech spurred more live viewership than Clinton's.

The six channels included here are CNN, Fox News, MSNBC, NBC, ABC, and CBS.

Nielsen will release a more complete audience estimate for Clinton's speech later in the day on Friday, including Spanish language broadcasters and smaller cable channels.

All in all, 32.2 million people tuned in for Trump last week, according to Nielsen.

The company's data does not incorporate live streaming or web video clips that are viewed later.

A live stream of Clinton's speech had more than 200,000 simultaneous viewers on YouTube Thursday night.

But the vast majority of convention viewing still happens the traditional way -- live, on TV sets, through channels like CNN and NBC.

CNN was by far the highest-rated channel on Thursday, averaging 7.5 million viewers during Clinton's speech. MSNBC was #2 with 5.3 million viewers. NBC was #3 with 4.5 million.

While Trump's speech was slightly higher-rated on TV, the results were reversed on Facebook, which measured the volume of conversation about each convention.

Facebook said the final day of the DNC generated "46.5 million likes, posts, comments and shares" from 12.6 million American users, slightly ahead of the final day of the RNC, when the site had 45.1 million interactions from 12.2 million users.

Trump, a former reality TV star, is a student of both social media and TV ratings; he frequently comments on his attention-grabbing abilities.

But the Democrats' gathering in Philadelphia turned out to be higher-rated than the Republican convention in Cleveland through Wednesday.

Monday night's DNC speeches were seen by 26 million viewers across seven channels, versus 23 million for night one of the RNC.

Tuesday night's DNC coverage averaged 24 million, versus 19 million for night two of the RNC.

And Wednesday night attracted 24.4 million viewers, versus 23.4 million viewers for the RNC.

Final numbers for Thursday will be available later in the day on Friday.

http://money.cnn.com/2016/07/29/medi...-four-ratings/

Thank you American TV Viewers! And remember this doesn't count all the millions who watched much of the conventions on C-Span.

Congratulations Donald Trump and Republican National Convention for the great ratings! It was a great convention, it could have been better if Republicans had stuck together but some chose not to, some chose to be burrs in the saddle, the swarming mosquitoes at the BBQ, the rain on the parade, but the outcome was wonderful, our candidate won by a landslide, was nominated, everything is now official and we're off and running.

Trump is the first presidential candidate in my memory that I am willing to sit down and listen to. I am not interested in what Clinton has to say.

I agree pkskyali. It's a joy really to listen to his speeches, especially the ones where he has his little list of notes and talks to the rally crowd from the heart. I love those. Could listen to them all day if I had the time. I don't like the scripted speeches as much, maybe he needs to practice, not talk so loud, and read more naturally. Personally, I think he should just do his off-script talks from now on. This is where he wins the voters.

I agree. Like I've said before, he is no Abraham Lincoln. But Lincoln was a lawyer, not a hotel magnate.

I guess we'll have to take what we can get.

He's wonderful when he's not reading from script and he's fabulous in his interviews with the press and his call ins when he calls into programs to address issues or comments they're talking about. This is the man who will be leading our nation, and he's the perfect one to do so. We want someone who loves press conferences, who loves picking up the phone, who loves addressing and confronting the issues and the people behind them. We don't want a coward con-woman with her head down emailing and texting all day and night. We want someone in the flesh, in their voice, attacking the wrong-doers, and fighting for US, face to face. This takes enormous energy, composure, temperament, commitment, intelligence, knowlege and courage, all traits of Donald J Trump.

VOTE FOR THE IN YOUR FACE BRAVE ONE!!

VOTE FOR DONALD J TRUMP FOR PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES!!

Did CNN & other news sources cut away from any speakers like they did with GOP speakers; e.g. Sen Sessions & victims of illegals families that were talking truth @ invaders. They denied the public that knowledge.

I saw a headline but didn't read the article that Fox News didn't show the Muslim father of the Muslim son killed in Iraq in 2004. You know the angry Muslim pointing his finger and waving a copy of our Constitution while his wife stood silent next to him with her head covered as he attacked Trump who of course had nothing to do with his son being killed in Iraq in 2004. Hillary of course voted to send him to Iraq but the Muslim supports Hillary who has "sacrificed nothing and no one" and authorized the war, and attacks Trump who totall opposed the War in Iraq.

Whether it's true that Fox didn't show that speech or not, I don't know. Sometimes they'll break away and then show something later.