Tucker Carlson Cancelled - Gone From Fox News

Pilgrim

Veteran Expediter
Retired Expediter
Tucker went on the air just three weeks after the election and had a whole monologue criticizing attorney Sidney Powell, who he had on as a guest previously.

You didn’t see that kind of criticism of guests on other “news” operations on the Left.
He also criticized the Ukraine war and Big Pharma (also a Big Advertiser). My guess is that he rubbed somebody influential the wrong way.
 

Turtle

Administrator
Staff member
Retired Expediter
Regardless, that prime 8PM time slot is dead for them, along with the viewers and the ad revenues Carlson brought. They simply don't have anyone that can replace him.
I dunno. Before Tucker that 8PM had Bill O'Reilly, Glenn Beck and Megyn Kelly. That timeslot seems to do pretty well regardless of who the host is.

It could also be considered the Kill Me timeslot because everyone who has had that slot has famously departed. Who hosted the first show after Tucker left? Brian Kilmeade, so that's kinda funny.

Regardless of his viewing numbers, his advertising renevue numbers have been of great concern for quite a while. Prior to 2020 his show was a cash cow sporting big name advertisers, including car companies, P&G, Disney, T-Mobile, big pharma, but he lost most of those in 2020 and 2021. So many brands have pulled out of the Carlson slot over the years, most of his remaining advertisers were closely associated with daytime or overnight advertisers, not Prime Time advertisers. In 2023 his advertisers have been MyPillow, Nutrisystem, Granite Stone, Relief Factor, PureTalkUSA, Coventry Direct, and Qunol. His largest two advertisers have been Fox News Channel itself, and the digital Fox News Nation.

So, good viewing numbers, but with deeply discounted revenue rates, mostly from companies you've never heard of unless you watched his show, is not a recipe for healthy bottom line sustainability. As Phil pointed out, Fox News' blip dip in stock price in meaningless. What will matter is the bottom line.
 

ATeam

Senior Member
Retired Expediter
I dunno. Before Tucker that 8PM had Bill O'Reilly, Glenn Beck and Megyn Kelly. That timeslot seems to do pretty well regardless of who the host is.
I agree. That time slot is in itself a valuable asset, regardless of who fills it. Naturally, a particular host can have an effect, but recent numbers show there is far more to the ratings of that time slot than Carlson himself. If it was all about Carlson, the numbers would have fallen off a cliff. But they did not fall off a cliff, did they?

Decline? Yes. Crater? Not even close.
 

muttly

Veteran Expediter
Retired Expediter
Unless someone has enough money to use it and do their own thing they have to answer to advertisers and a boss.

Even for Tucker to do some deal with billionaire Elon Musk on Twitter at first blush looked promising until you think about how he would be likely restricted on talking much about China or EV, or…
 

ATeam

Senior Member
Retired Expediter
Tanking bigly:
Interesting data. While two nights do not a trend make, it will be interesting to see if this significant decline in ratings remains in a week, month and six months. If it does, in what ways, if any, will the Republican Party be affected?
 

muttly

Veteran Expediter
Retired Expediter
Most of the defection would come from MAGA republicans who will seek out other places to get their information. There’s already plenty of other platforms. And as we’ve see with Tucker’s post on Twitter, it already had much more views than his show on cable did.
Many people have and are ditching cable anyway.
 
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muttly

Veteran Expediter
Retired Expediter
I agree. That time slot is in itself a valuable asset, regardless of who fills it. Naturally, a particular host can have an effect, but recent numbers show there is far more to the ratings of that time slot than Carlson himself. If it was all about Carlson, the numbers would have fallen off a cliff. But they did not fall off a cliff, did they?

Decline? Yes. Crater? Not even close.
You’ll see an epic decline. Most MAGA republicans only kept Fox News because they had Tucker. This isn’t a Megyn Kelly or O”Reilly split. Not even close.
 
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ATeam

Senior Member
Retired Expediter
You’ll see an epic decline. Most MAGA republicans only kept Fox News because they had Tucker. This isn’t a Megyn Kelly or O”Reilly split. Not even close.
You may be right. We'll find out together in coming weeks and months how this plays out.

Question. Let's say your are right and FOX permanently loses 50% of its viewers or more over the next six months. If that happens, FOX will be significantly weakened. Assuming FOX is significantly weakened, would that help, hurt or make no difference to the Republican Party and it's chances of winning elections at all levels in 2024?

I don't know the answer. I've never thought before about how much of a force FOX is (or is not) in convincing people to vote Republican.
 

Pilgrim

Veteran Expediter
Retired Expediter
I dunno. Before Tucker that 8PM had Bill O'Reilly, Glenn Beck and Megyn Kelly. That timeslot seems to do pretty well regardless of who the host is.
Glenn Beck actually had the 5PM time slot, and had record ratings before he got the boot. The Five has it now and is doing even better. In the 8PM slot Megyn Kelly wasn't very likeable to begin with, then got herself in trouble with her viewers when she attacked Trump during the presidential debates. O'Reilly got a lot of bad publicity with his last messy sexual harassment lawsuit, and that tainted his image to a degree from which he couldn't recover, and advertisers started to bail. The circumstances of these two victims of Fox's 8PM curse were a bit different from Carlson; he was and still is wildly popular with his viewers, and his ad revenues were rising in 2022.

"More recently, however, Carlson’s program has seen ad dollars return, according to Vivvix, a tracker of ad spending. In 2022, advertisers spent around $77.5 million on “Tucker Carlson Tonight,” compared with $67.6 million in 2021 — representing a jump of approximately 14.7%. In contract, “Hannity” captured nearly $50.4 million in 2022, while “The Ingraham Angle” lured about $53.7 million."

But we'll have to wait and see how this soap opera plays out over time, and it depends on the direction Fox wants to take with its programming. They'll continue to be the most successful network because they've got a monopoly on the conservative viewership. If people want to watch opinion shows with a right-leaning bias there's no other place on mainstream cable networks to go. Meanwhile, Carlson is still highly marketable and will likely land on his feet; he's not going away.

 

Turtle

Administrator
Staff member
Retired Expediter
Tucker has always been envious of Dave Ruben, who operates out of his home and is his own boss. That's what Tucker will do next. And as his comments in the video slightly allude to, IMNSHO, it'll be a debate-based podcast with real, meaningful debates on the topic of the day.
 
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ATeam

Senior Member
Retired Expediter
Tucker's Twitter video got over 15 Million views in 14 hours, and 48.2 Million views as of 10AM today.
I was one of those viewers out of curiosity. But it is highly unlikely that I'll be one of his regular audience members if he goes on air again.

Thank goodness for Twitter, right? There is no other platform that can give Carlson that kind of reach.
 

Pilgrim

Veteran Expediter
Retired Expediter
Tucker has always been envious of Dave Ruben, who operates out of his home and is his own boss. That's what Tucker will do next. And as his comments in the video slightly allude to, IMNSHO, it'll be a debate-based podcast with real, meaningful debates on the topic of the day.
I was thinking he might go the Joe Rogan route, but both business models would probably work for Carlson. Personally, I've never listened to either Rogan or Rubin, but a lot of people I know do listen to both. I was shocked at the audience Rogan commands through a podcast. Carlson could probably take his audience with him to a format like this, as implied in the Megyn Kelly clips. That would be >3 Million viewers - many of whom might be first time podcast users - that would never go back to Fox News.

 

ATeam

Senior Member
Retired Expediter
Will Tucker Carlson Run for President?

I'm seeing the occasional comment on the news that Tucker Carlson my run for president. I don't see him doing that. His association with extremist views would alienate him from the general electorate, and he's smart enough to know that. At least I think he's smart enough to know that. That said, it would be fun to watch the Trump meltdown if Carlson even hinted he might run. If Carlson did run, I'd be little concerned about that. While he might be able to pull off a surprise primary victory and secure the Republican nomination, he'd have ZERO chance of winning the general election.

Your thoughts? Might Carlson run for president on 2024?
 
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muttly

Veteran Expediter
Retired Expediter
No, Carlson won’t run. Trump is up by almost 50 points. He’s got the nomination.
Note to the Left: Tucker and DeSantis won’t be your Knights In Shining Armor to take out Trump. No need for debates either. It’s over.
 
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