CNN Show Hits All-Time Ratings Low

CNN’s Reliable Sources has reached rock bottom as the weekend program recently marked viewership lows for the year.

Left-leaning host Brian Stelter has struggled all November but received his smallest 2021 audience Sunday, failing to even reach 600,000 viewers for the first time. This was 10% lower than his previous week, which was also among the show’s worst turnouts of the year. The program Stelter has hosted since 2013 now has failed to average 800,000 every week since early August.

Stelter also struggled to attract viewers among the 25-54 demographic, averaging only 87,000, for his fourth-smallest audience of the year in the coveted category.

Much of this could stem from continuous false advertising. While Reliable Sources claims to examine the media industry each episode, it often devolves into an hour of bashing Republicans and excusing stories that make Democrats look bad.

For example, Stelter ignored MSNBC’s recent ban from covering the Kyle Rittenhouse trial; instead, he interviewed the American-hating Nikole Hannah-Jones and ABC News Reporter Jonathan Karl about their new books.

Stelter also had segments criticizing how conservative media covered the Rittenhouse trial and bemoaned that CNN can’t air trials related to the Jan. 6 Capitol riots because cameras aren’t allowed.

By comparison, Fox News’ concurrent competition, MediaBuzz, averaged 1.5 million viewers and 200,000 among the 25-54 demo last week. Ironically, that FNC show is hosted by Howard Kurtz, who hosted Reliable Sources before Stelter. Kurtz wisely left.

Maybe instead of bashing Tucker Carlson, Stelter could learn how to draw an audience?

"The exalting of Kyle Rittenhouse reached new heights on Monday evening when Tucker Carlson used his top-rated Fox News prime time program to lavish even more praise on the teenager," @oliverdarcy writes https://t.co/WUSk9YC1DZ

— Brian Stelter (@brianstelter) November 23, 2021