Trump’s Tulsa rally scores big ratings for Fox News Channel

Weekend news programming accounted for three of last week’s four prime-time programs to average more than 6 million viewers, topped by Fox News Channel’s coverage of President Trump’s rally.

The rally coverage that aired during “Watters’ World” and “Justice With Judge Jeanine” Saturday averaged 7.654 million viewers. “The Greg Gutfeld Show” that followed the rally averaged 4.642 million viewers, eighth among prime-time programs between June 15 and Sunday and second among cable programs, giving Fox News Channel its largest Saturday prime-time audience ever, with 6.65 million viewers.

The rally coverage and the political talk shows “Tucker Carlson Tonight” and “Hannity” gave Fox News Channel, which has been in operation since 1996, the week’s highest ratings, averaging 3.675 million viewers, outperforming all four major broadcast networks.

CBS was second for the week, after 18 consecutive victories, averaging 3.37 million viewers, followed by NBC, which averaged 3.13 million, and ABC, which averaged 2.67 million.

On Sunday, the CBS newsmagazine “60 Minutes” averaged 7.1 million viewers and “The Room Where It Happened: ABC News Exclusive Interview With John Bolton” averaged 6.219 million viewers. That special was fourth for the week and second-highest among ABC prime-time programs in the four weeks of television’s summer season, behind the June 4 season finale of “Who Wants to Be a Millionaire,” which averaged 6.516 million viewers.

NBC’s “America’s Got Talent” was the highest-rated prime-time program for the fourth time this summer, averaging 8.572 million viewers, according to live-plus-same-day figures released Tuesday by Nielsen.

Viewership for both of Sunday’s music specials was considerably lower than the programming their networks aired in the time slot the previous Sunday.

“John Legend and Family” averaged 3.257 million viewers, first in its 8-9 p.m. time slot, 41st for the week and sixth among ABC programs. Viewership was down 38.1 percent from “Celebrity Family Feud,” which averaged 5.26 million viewers the previous Sunday, second in the time slot, sixth for the week and first among ABC programs.

“United We Sing: A Grammy Tribute to the Unsung Heroes” averaged 2.765 million viewers, second in its 8-10 p.m. time slot behind ABC’s combination of “John Legend and Family” and the Bolton interview; it was 56th for the week and 17th among CBS programs. The special averaged 3.36 million viewers for its first hour and 2.26 million its second.

Fox News Channel’s ratings were bolstered by the Monday through Thursday editions of “Tucker Carlson Live,” which all ranked among the week’s 15 most-watched programs, topped by the Monday edition, which averaged 4.206 million viewers, 11th for the week.

The Wednesday edition of “Hannity” was ninth for the week, averaging 4.54 million, while the Tuesday edition was 16th for the week, averaging 3.98 million, one spot ahead of the Thursday edition, which averaged 3.861 million viewers.

MSNBC was second among cable networks for the second consecutive week, averaging 1.978 million viewers. CNN was third for the second consecutive week, averaging 1.644 million.