Rachel Maddow remains obssessed with impeachment as ratings tank

May 31, 2019

Gage Skidmore / CCL

Life after Mueller hasn’t been easy for MSNBC’s Rachel Maddow. Arguably the most dedicated Russian collusion hoaxer in the mainstream media, Maddow saw her ratings drop off immediately after Robert Mueller released his demoralizing no-collusion verdict in March. Two months later, her ratings are continuing their post-Mueller slump.

Maddow’s ratings in the 25-54 age demographic hit their lowest point in May since Trump took office, while she finished third overall behind Fox’s Sean Hannity and Tucker Carlson.

All the same, Maddow remains fixated on impeachment as if Mueller’s investigation had never ended.

Maddow’s ratings crash post-Mueller

Maddow averaged 410,000 in the coveted 25-54 demo, her lowest rating since Trump took office. Maddow averaged 412,000 viewers in the demo in January 2017. The ratings slump marks a low point for Maddow’s post-Mueller free fall.

24,626

Over two years of marinating in collusion insanity, Maddow gradually became the Alex Jones of the #Resistance. On a nightly basis, Maddow served up salacious, tabloid tripe about the president and Moscow, burnished over with her signature make-pretend academic seriousness.

As she validated the grievances of liberals who shared her inability to accept the result of the 2016 election, Maddow’s show became essential prime-time viewing to anyone looking for in-depth analysis of “pee tapes” and arcana about meetings in Prague. In January, Maddow’s program was still going strong, averaging 3.3 million viewers.

Then, tragedy struck. Which is to say, reality happened. Maddow’s ratings tapered to 3.1 million in February, and then 2.9 million in March, when Mueller’s probe concluded.

The crash hit hardest the Monday after attorney general William Barr released a summary of Mueller’s investigation stating that no collusion was discovered. Maddow lost 500,000 viewers that night.

 

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ratings dropped again to an average 2.63 million. They tapered off even more in May to 2.6 million as the post-Mueller depression lingered.

Mueller mania

Overall, Maddow placed third in prime-time this month. Hannity scored 3.1 million viewers and Carlson got 2.76 million.

Despite the ratings slump, Maddow is still manning the battlements of her tinfoil fortress, serving up Mueller mania with as much fervor as ever. After spending two years talking about collusion, Maddow is still waiting for impeachment day to come — this time, she hopes, over obstruction.

Like the rest of the anti-Trump pundits in the legacy media, Maddow is convinced that she was right all along, and whatever identity crisis she might have suffered in March seems to be fading after Robert Mueller’s spontaneous press conference Wednesday. In his first and final remarks on the investigation, Mueller said that indicting Trump was “not an option” the Justice Department could pursue. Maddow jubilated, convinced that the exalted Mueller had finally validated her conspiracy-mongering.

Americans are fatigued from all of the Russia speculation, but the liberal rage that Maddow tapped into hasn’t gone away. While it’s still too soon to tell, Maddow could experience a rebound if the media is able to spin a compelling impeachment fantasy out of Mueller’s judgment.

Time heals all wounds, and this is nowhere more true than in the legacy media. Even after being exposed for pushing the biggest lie in yellow journalism, the media is still driving the national dialogue, keeping the nation hostage in its impeachment fever dream. Already, they have sent “collusion” down the memory hole and fabricated an entirely new impeachment case around “obstruction.” It’s as if those two years of Maddow’s collusion hype never happened at all.

And Maddow’s impeachment squad is dispersing. Even the New York Times is reportedly banning its reporters from Maddow’s show. But millions of Americans share her grudge over the 2016 election. Until Trump’s last day in office, we can expect Maddow will be banging the impeachment drum — and her Dump Trump battalions will follow.