Unintended consequences of the Tucker Carlson firing

Newsmax ratings climb after Tucker Carlson’s exit at Fox

The New York Times has even recognized the sea change created by the kneejerk reaction firing of Tucker Carlson at Fox News.

Newsmax, the niche conservative news channel that has long played David to Fox News’s Goliath, has seized on Tucker Carlson’s shock dismissal from its rival network and declared itself the true TV home for right-wing Americans.

So far, the strategy is showing some promise.

Viewership of Newsmax remains far below that of Fox News. But its audience at certain hours has doubled, and in some time slots tripled, in the immediate aftermath of Mr. Carlson’s exit — an abrupt spike that has turned heads in conservative circles and the cable news industry.

On Monday evening, Eric Bolling’s 8 p.m. Newsmax program drew 531,000 viewers, according to Nielsen. One week earlier, it had 146,000. On Tuesday, Mr. Bolling’s audience grew to 562,000 viewers, equal to about 80 percent of Anderson Cooper’s CNN viewership that evening. Newsmax’s other prime-time shows also experienced big jumps.

The sharp rise in viewership can be timed almost to the minute of Fox News’s announcement on Monday that it was parting ways with Mr. Carlson, in part because of private messages sent by the anchor that included offensive and crude remarks.

Executives at Newsmax quickly sensed an opportunity.

Starting on Monday, Newsmax programming has aggressively pushed a narrative that Mr. Carlson’s dismissal was a capitulation to the left by Fox News and the Murdoch family.

One pundit mused on the air that Lachlan Murdoch, the executive chairman of the Fox Corporation, was “much more liberal” than his father, Rupert. Andrew Napolitano, a Newsmax pundit who was fired by Fox News in 2021 over a harassment allegation, said Fox News dismissing its top-rated anchor “is like the 1927 Yankees firing Babe Ruth for his table manners — I don’t get it.”

Anchors and guests harped on a recent appearance by Representative Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, a New York Democrat, in which she called for Mr. Tucker’s firing. “A.O.C. speaks, and now Fox listens,” grumbled the Newsmax anchor Chris Salcedo. “These really are end times.”

(continued)

At the time, Newsmax saw a burst in viewership, even recording higher ratings than the Fox News anchor Martha MacCallum one evening in December 2020. (Ms. MacCallum was switched to a different time slot not long afterward.) But its audience eventually shrank. And despite Mr. Trump’s complaints, Fox News continued as the undisputed ratings king of cable news, powered in part by Mr. Carlson’s increasingly provocative program.

(Read even the bilge I skipped at the New York Times)

The Tucker viewers will not go to CNN, no matter how much the Times wishes

No matter how much body english the Times applies to its words, they will not be able to bamboozle conservatives by twisting the facts. First off, any conservative reading the Times is doing it with an eye not to be fooled. They know the constant Marxist diatribe to be expected from the Times. Second, in sheer numbers, those numbers of conservatives reading the Times are small.

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Now we know how much more Tucker knows his brand than Fox

NewsMax outlines the business and media savvy of Tucker Carlson as he traverses the ever-changing landscape.

Tucker knows his brand, Fox, not so much

One thing is for sure: Tucker Carlson understands branding. Whether you like him or not, the conservative firebrand knows his brand and appreciates all its benefits.

His departure from the “fair and balanced” network — FNC, has prognosticators speculating on what happened, leading to the news of why he left the Fox News Channel.

Some have identified his moving on from being one of the casualties of the Dominion Voting Machines lawsuit, where Fox had to pay over a half-billion dollars in damages, to speculation there were additional lawsuits that Carlson was involved in, to the simple old idea, that Rupert Murdoch didn’t like Tucker.

It is no secret that the news business is a personality industry replete with egos that can turn a career faster than a speeding bullet or, for that matter, a news cycle.

There is also the theory that Mr. Murdoch was over Carlson’s prima-donna antics. His airing of additional January 6 footage challenged the Democrat’s insurrection theory, his anti-Ukraine anti-war position, and his many other nonconventional opinions that only reinforced his brand to his countless and loyal audience.

This series of events didn’t wear well with the elder Murdoch and led to the parting of ways between these grand brands.

If Tucker understands his brand, what can be said about the Fox News Channel? It doesn’t say a lot. From a branding perspective, Fox has lost sight of its brand and appeal to its loyal audience over the years.

(Read more at NewsMax)

Yes, there is a bias at this blog

I do hope that Tucker enjoys greater success, at least for the short term, than Fox.

Additionally, there is the input of Victor Davis Hanson

To get the outside perspecitive of the Telegraph, here is a long-format interview of Victor Davis Hanson by the Telegraph on the firing of Tucker Carlson.