Former Fox News host Megyn Kelly sold out her conservative viewers and took a huge $20 million payday to move to NBC — and it’s going very badly.
So badly, she’s losing the ratings war… to reruns!
Two weeks ago, critics slammed Kelly’s debut and called her interview with Russian dictator Vladimir Putin tepid and unengaging.
Earlier this week, company’s began pulling out their advertising dollars in response to Kelly’s latest publicity; She is hosting conspiracy theorist Alex Jones on Sunday.
The news has only gotten worse for Kelly.
On Wednesday, some of the first ratings for Kelly’s show, Sunday Night With Megyn Kelly, were released — and it’s a total train wreck.
This Sunday, Kelly pulled in 3.61 million total viewers and scored a weak 0.6 rating in the all-important adults 18-49 demographic. That’s a 40% decline from her first show, when she hosted Putin.
To put that in perspective, Kelly’s show lost out to a rerun of America’s Funniest Home Videos, which boasted 30,000 more viewers.
Meanwhile, 7.88 million viewers tuned in to CBS’ 60 Minutes during that same time — more than double what Kelly brought in.
“Kelly’s numbers did not hurt NBC for the night however, with Game 5 of the Stanley Cup Playoffs pulling in just under 7 million viewers and garnering a very impressive 2.3 rating in the target demo,” according to The Daily Mail.
In other words: Once Kelly came on, millions of viewers immediately tuned out.
That’s a very bad start to someone with such an extravagant salary — and rumors are swirling that company executives are already unhappy.
“When NBC News announced earlier this year that it lured Megyn Kelly from Fox News Channel, it was counting on the star anchor to draw attention,” Variety reported. “She’s delivering — though perhaps not in the way executives had hoped.”
— The Horn editorial team