Two conclusions leap out from the ratings of televised presidential debates:

- the viewing public is already tiring of the Democrats’ presidential field;

- the viewing public doesn’t trust and doesn’t want to watch CNN – even when it is televising live events.

Writing at Breitbart, John Nolte gathers and analyzes the ratings data. Here is the data on the four 2019 Democrat presidential debates in sequnce:   

First debate (on CNN)

In June, the first Democrat debate of the year, hosted by NBC, MSNBC, and Telemundo, drew 15.3 million viewers on night one and 18.1 million viewers on night two, for an average of 16.7 million.

Second debate (on CNN)

Back in July, far-left CNN hosted the second debate of the year, a two-night event that drew 8.7 million and 10.7 million viewers, for an average of 9.7 million.

Third debate (on ABC)

14 million

Fourth Debate (on CNN)

CNN’s Tuesday night Democrat debate drew only 8.3 million viewers

It is clear that overall the trend is down, but that the third debate on ABC spiked up a bit from the previous debate on CNN, only to see the fourth debate on CNN continue the ratings decline. The third ABC debate was still down from the first CNN debate, but below the first CNN debate.

While it is true that ABC reaches households that do not subscribe to cable or satellite television, that difference is not enough to account for the entire differential. And previous presidential debates on cable channels have far outdrawn ABC’s current ratings. For instance:

CNN hosted a Republican debate during the 2016 primary that attracted 23 million viewers.

 and

… during the 2016 presidential campaign, 15.5 million viewers watched the first debate between Hillary Clinton and Bernie Sanders on CNN.

Nolte concludes:

So, at one time, CNN was able to compete with the broadcast networks. But now Democrat primary voters are turning away in droves whenever one of their debates airs on the far-left cable channel.

It is evident that CNN’s descent into naked propagandizing against Trump, particulrly its hysteria over the Russiagate conspiracy theory has damaged its credibility even with viewers who favor or are particularly iterested in Democrats. And then there are the recent ongoing disclosures from Project Veritas, showing the orders from the top have made everything that gets on CNN’s air has to be shaped to reflect negatively on President Trump. Even Democrats – at least some of them, anyway – shy away from watching a propaganda tool masquerading s a news outlet even when covering their own candidates.