CNN’s Wednesday town hall about guns came in third place in both total viewers and the 25-54 demo, with Fox News coming in first and MSNBC in second place.
The town hall, titled America Under Assault: The Gun Crisis, aired at 9 p.m. EST and drew in an average of 1.2 million total viewers. Fox News’ Hannity, which featured an interview with 2020 candidate Mayor Bill de Blasio, averaged 3.3 million viewers. MSNBC’s The Rachel Maddow Show had an average 2.3 million total viewers in the same time slot.
CNN only had about 285,000 viewers in the 25-54 demo, while Fox News had about 531,000, according to Nielsen Media Research.
Cuomo opened up the program by chastising the National Rifle Association for refusing the network’s invitation to participate.
“I guess they want to do their talking with propaganda ads and millions in lobbying. Besides, let’s be honest, the gun lobby is not going to be the answer,” Cuomo said.
“And that shouldn’t be expected anymore than we expected Big Tobacco to help us expose the ills of smoking. The reality is, people like you are the answer, and there can be no sides when it comes to wanting to be safer, better protected,” he said.
Wednesday’s town hall is the second CNN has hosted after mass shootings, with the first one hosted a week after the 2017 mass shooting at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School in Parkland, Florida. Hosted by anchor Jake Tapper, the Florida town hall drew in 58% more viewers than Cuomo’s.
Some criticized Tapper’s town hall for taking place too soon after the shooting, for apparently taking sides on the issues, and for giving a platform to former Broward County Sheriff Scott Israel.
CORRECTION: A previous version of this article indicated that Hannity pulled in 3.1 million viewers. We have corrected the error.
