Former President Donald Trump's Wednesday night Fox News town hall had higher ratings than a simultaneous CNN debate between former South Carolina Gov. Nikki Haley and Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis, according to data released Thursday. It exceeded the audience rating of 68%.
The 77-year-old Republican front-runner headlined the most-watched TV show of the night, with a total of 4.3 million viewers watching his hour-long performance in Des Moines, according to early data released by Nielsen Media. watched.
Just 2.53 million people watched the two-hour showdown between Haley and DeSantis at Drake University in the Iowa capital.
President Trump also topped the ratings for the Haley-DeSantis debate among the coveted 25-54 demographic, with 553,000 people watching the former president's appearance and 509,000 watching the former president's appearance. watched the governor's grudge match.
who is the former commander 36 percentage points or more On the air, Ms. Haley, who topped Ms. Haley and Mr. DeSantis in the RealClearPolitics Iowa polling average, backtracked on hints that she would soon choose a running mate and criticized President Biden's Middle East policy.
He has also been involved in a number of other issues, including the FBI's 2016 investigation into his campaign over allegations of collusion with the Russian government and the efforts of former intelligence officials to allege damning Post reporting against Joe, a major political opponent. He also talked about the “fabrication'' he made when he ran for president in his second presidential election.Biden was a “disinformation” created by the Kremlin
But when asked by Fox News moderators Bret Baier and Martha McCollum whether a second administration would achieve “retaliation” against these adversaries, President Trump demurred.
“First of all, a lot of people would say it's not that bad,” he said. “Look at what they did – the Russia, Russia, Russia hoax, the FBI and Twitter hoax, the 51 agent hoax, all these different hoaxes that they did. A lot of people would probably say that's pretty normal.”
“We are going to make this country successful again. There is no time for retaliation,” he added. “Our ultimate reward is success.”
Haley, President Trump's former ambassador to the United Nations, has been floated by some as the front-runner for vice president, but she has repeatedly refused to exclude her from being considered by reporters.
“I don't play second,” the 51-year-old female candidate has often answered.
In this head-to-head debate, the two main contestants competed to compare their records as former state leaders. However, Trump's absence led many commentators to deride the event as a “race for second place.”
Former New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie also threw a curve ball Wednesday afternoon when he canceled his campaign hours before the debate was to begin and was grabbed onto a heated microphone to disparage Haley and DeSantis.
“She's going to go up in smoke. And you and I both know that, she's not going to do something like this,” Christie said at New Hampshire City Hall, where she will finish her 2024 campaign. I talked about Haley a minute ago.
The Garden Stater added that DeSantis called the Florida governor “petrified,” but it was not immediately clear what surprised the Florida governor.
Mr. DeSantis, 45, participated in the “Great Red State vs. Blue State Debate” with California Gov. Gavin Newsom, which drew 4.75 million live viewers to FNC on Nov. 30, according to Nielsen ratings. It achieved good results in viewership ratings.
DeSantis has focused her campaign on winning Iowa, visiting all 99 counties to meet with voters, but she is currently trailing Haley in the race. RealClear polling aggregator The difference was 2 percentage points.
