Friday, May 22, 2026

Cable News Shocker: Rachel Maddow Trounced Sean Hannity This Week, Opened Up a 400,000 Viewer Lead

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UPDATE: Last night, Maddow had a 400,000 viewer lead, 3.5 million to 3.1 million.

EARLIER Donald Trump is flailing, his world is crumbling, and Sean Hannity is ignoring it.

That’s the lesson we can draw from the cable news ratings this week. So far, MSNBC’s Rachel Maddow handily beat FoxNews’s Hannity Monday through Wednesday at 9pm. (We’re waiting now for last night’s numbers.)

Indeed, Maddow has opened up a 200,000+ lead over Hannity this week, trouncing him as the various scandals– Stormy Daniels, illegitimate kids with maids, Comey’s book, etc– kept unraveling. And that’s all besides Russia and collusion.

Maddow is also widening the gap age wise. Her audience in the target demo– 18 to 49– was .42 on Wednesday, well ahead of Hannity’s .27. Maddow had 3,257,000 viewers on Wednesday night. Hannity had 3,045,000.

Hannity thought his feud with Jimmy Kimmel would bring him more viewers. What he didn’t get was that his people are old, and don’t stay up to watch Kimmel. They may not know who he is at all. And don’t care.

 

Numbers courtesy of ShowbuzzDaily

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Roger Friedman
Roger Friedmanhttps://www.showbiz411.com
Roger Friedman is the founder and editor-in-chief of Showbiz411. He wrote the FOX411 column on FoxNews.com from 1999 to 2009 and previously edited Fame magazine and wrote the "Intelligencer" column at New York magazine. His bylines have appeared in The New York Times, The Washington Post, the New York Daily News, the New York Post, Vogue, Details, and the Miami Herald. He is a voting member of the Critics Choice Awards (Film and Television branches), and his movie reviews are tracked by Rotten Tomatoes. is articles have appeared in dozens of publications over the years including New York Magazine, where he wrote the Intelligencer column in the mid 90s and covered the OJ Simpson trial, and Fox News (when it wasn't so crazy) where he covered Michael Jackson. With D.A. Pennebaker and Chris Hegedus, he co-produced the 2002 documentary "Only the Strong Survive," which screened at Directors' Fortnight at the Cannes Film Festival.

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