TV viewers for the second presidential debate virtually grew for all participating networks.
NBC scored the biggest numbers for the Tuesday
event -- 13.8 million viewers, according to early Nielsen results. Some analysts are crediting the big lead-in of "The Voice," alongside the belief that viewers thought debate coverage wouldn't differ
much from one network to the next.
For the first presidential debate, NBC had 11.1 million viewers.
ABC was right behind NBC for the second debate at 13.5 million viewers -- it had
11.3 million for the first time, leading all networks. Cable network the Fox News Channel was at 11.1 million; it had 10.4 million for the first debate.
CBS was a bit behind the pace for
the second debate, at 8.9 million. Then came the Fox network at 4.2 million. (Fox had 6.9 million viewers for the first debate).
Other cable networks trailing were CNN at 5.8 million and
MSNBC at 4.9 million. These last two cable networks did better the first time around: CNN at 6.7 million and MSNBC with 4.7 million.
For the vice presidential debate, Fox News Channel led
all networks -- cable and broadcast getting to 10 million; CBS had 8.31 million; ABC, 8.29 million; and NBC, 7.9 million. Among the other cable networks, MSNBC was up over CNN: 4.4 million to 4.1
million.
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