It was a huge quarter for the Sunday morning public affairs programs, at least from a year-over-year standpoint. Each program was up in total viewers and up in the ad-friendly A25-54 demo from the same quarter in 2015, according to “Most Current Data” from Nielsen Media Research.
Face the Nation with John Dickerson was the most-watched Sunday morning public affairs show for the quarter, up 11 percent from the same quarter in 2015. FTN finished behind Meet the Press and This Week in the A25-54 demo, but still managed to improve by 8 percent in that category year-over-year.
Meet the Press with Chuck Todd experienced the most year-over-year growth of the Sunday morning public affairs shows. MTP finished Q2 2016 as the No. 1 Sunday show in the key demo, up 27 percent from Q2 2015. It was also the second most-watched Sunday show for the quarter, up 32 percent in total viewers from Q2 2015. Overall, MTP drew its biggest Q2 audience in eight years.
For the third consecutive year, This Week with George Stephanopoulos was up year-over-year in Q2, both in total viewers (+16 percent) and in A25-54 (+1 percent). The program delivered its most-watched Q2 in 17 years and its strongest performance among A25-54 in 8 years.
Fox News Sunday had a strong quarter in its own right, up 19 percent in total viewers and up 18.5 percent in A25-54 from the same quarter one year ago.
Face the Nation is based on the first half-hour only, as the full contiguous hour aired in just 76.3% of the country.
Q2 2016:
| Network | Program | Total Viewers | A25-54 |
|---|---|---|---|
| CBS |
Face the Nation | 3.575 M | 872,000 |
| ABC | This Week | 3.117 M | 885,000 |
| NBC | Meet the Press | 3.467 M | 1.035 M |
| FOX | Fox News Sunday | 1.475 M | 435,000 |
| UNIV | Al Punto* |
*Al Punto ratings will be added when they become available.
As for June 26, Meet the Press was the No. 1 Sunday morning public affairs show, both in total viewers and in A25-54. MTP was up 14 percent in total viewers and up 20 percent in A25-54 from the comparable Sunday in 2015. With rebroadcasts on the NBC and on MSNBC, an additional 1.268 million total viewers and 373,000 A25-54 viewers watched MTP on Sunday.
Face the Nation finished No. 2 in total viewers and No. 3 in A25-54. FTN was up 8.5 in total viewers and up by an impressive 28 percent in A25-54. The episode began with a taped interview with Marco Rubio from Miami.
This Week finished No. 3 in total viewers and No. 2 in A25-54, though not by much. This Week was up 12 percent in total viewers but down 6 percent in A25-54 from the comparable Sunday in 2015.
Fox News Sunday had the most impressive year-over-year growth when it came to total viewers: +21 percent. The program was also up 7 percent in A25-54. Fox News Sunday combined with cable replays delivered 3,880,000 total viewers and 833,000 A25-54.
June 26, 2016:
| Network | Program | Total Viewers | A25-54 |
|---|---|---|---|
| CBS |
Face the Nation | 3.213 M | 796,000 |
| ABC | This Week | 3.058 M | 889,000 |
| NBC | Meet the Press | 3.284 M | 1.018 M |
| FOX | Fox News Sunday | 1.406 M | 385,000 |
| UNIV | Al Punto* |
*Al Punto ratings will be added when they become available.