President Donald Trump will go down as one of the most influential presidents to ever hold office.
And his legacy could impact news as we know it should former Fox News host Bill O’Reilly’s latest prediction is right.
According to O’Reilly, Trump’s departure can only mean one thing.
The collapse of cable news media.
The bombshell prediction comes amid shifting numbers in television news viewership, a trend that has seen Fox News ratings dramatically plummet in wake of the 2020 election. The network received harsh criticism after it called the election for Joe Biden on the following Saturday after Tuesday’s big vote.
Fox News, which enjoyed four years of unprecedented success, is now in a viewership freefall. Trump supporters are turning to a different channel.
Even CNN anchors are noticing.
Brian Stelter wrote, “At this point, I think we can confidently say that Newsmax is cutting into Fox’s base.”
Newsmax — a self-described independent news agency — saw a 183 percent viewership boost as of last Thursday. Though its numbers still fall far behind major cable news networks, the shift is a clear warning signal that O’Reilly may be onto something.
Newsmax CEO Christopher Ruddy admitted that he’s taking sharp aim at the longtime king of cable news.
“We would like to overtake Fox News in the next 12 months,” he said, “and I think it’s do-able.”
According to reports, Trump’s lawyers have already looked into the possibility of buying out the Newsmax network and turning it into a “Trump TV” style network.
As for the other networks, such as the more liberal CNN and NBC, O’Reilly says those two will share Fox News’ fate.
“They don’t have any credibility,” he said, adding “… they were trying to destroy Trump.”
O’Reilly predicted that Americans will increasingly turn off liberal news outlets as they continue to shower Biden with favorable coverage.
And it will kill cable news as we know it.
The Horn editorial team