It was a sports-filled Memorial Day Weekend. It should not be a surprise, then, that the majority of the Sunday public affairs programs were down year-over-year. Face the Nation was the top public affairs program of the day, both in total viewers and in A25-54. That said, the episode was down 15 percent in total viewers and down 1 percent in the demo from the comparable Sunday in 2015 (May 31). That Sunday also happened to be Bob Schieffer’s final episode as host of Face the Nation.
Sunday’s edition of Meet The Press with Chuck Todd finished No. 3 in both key categories. The episode had only 84% coverage due to NBC Sports live coverage of Formula 1 and the French Open. Not surprisingly, MTP was down 31 percent in total viewers and down 36 percent in the demo from the comparable Sunday in 2015. Cumulatively, MTP was seen by a total of 3.095 million total viewers and 964,000 in the demo.
ABC This Week with George Stephanopoulos took second place in both key categories. The episode was down 18 percent in total viewers and down 27 percent in the demo from the comparable Sunday in 2015. Similar to MTP, This Week had to deal with sports programming, and the most recent episode for each program has been excluded from season averages. This Week was preempted on the west coast due to the Indy 500.
Fox News Sunday was the only Sunday public affairs program to see a year-over-year increase both in total viewers and A25-54. The original telecast on FOX was up 14 percent in total viewers and 23 percent in the demo year-over-year. Combining with cable replays, the program drew 3.759 million total viewers. Replays on FNC averaged a combined 2.32 million total viewers and 391,000 demo viewers.
Al Punto was up 11 percent in total viewers from the comparable Sunday in 2015. This was predominantly driven by the older demographics of A35+ and A50+.
*MTP will air at 8 a.m. ET/ 5 a.m. PT this coming Sunday. The show may be pre-empted in some markets but will be available On Demand with video available online at MeetThePressNBC.com.
**Face the Nation is based on the first half-hour only, as the full contiguous hour aired in just 76.3% of the country.
The numbers for May 29:
| Network | Program | Total Viewers | A25-54 |
|---|---|---|---|
| CBS |
Face the Nation | 3.342 M | 792,000 |
| ABC | This Week | 2.315 M | 650,000 |
| NBC | Meet the Press | 1.709 M | 492,000 |
| FOX | Fox News Sunday | 1.439 M | 443,000 |
| UNIV | Al Punto | 638,000 | 275,000 |