James Cross
Cable television is an important part of life, and news shows are no exception. The modern era has many conveniences, and the ability to get news from all over the world as it’s happening is one of them. It’s important to stay informed, as well as understand how different people see the world, making the different news channels highly important.
A Prominent Name in News
Fox News is the most prominent name in conservative news broadcasting. It lines up alongside further right stations such as Newsmax and OANN, and opposes more liberal news networks such as CNN and MSNBC.
Fox and the other news channels have all been around for decades. The rise of the 24-hour news cycle in the 80’s meant that there were people who needed to know what was going on, both locally, in the country, and in the world, and news organizations rose to fill the demand.
Back in 1996
Fox News is the brainchild of the Australian-American media mogul, Rupert Murdoch. He created the channel in 1996, in order to appeal to a conservative audience in a TV world that was dominated by the likes of CNN.
Fox launched on October 7 with 17 million cable subscribers, with former CNBC executive, Roger Ailes, at the helm as CEO. This would be a decision that would later come back to haunt both Fox and Murdoch, but Ailes was a vicious businessman who stopped at nothing to achieve the goals that he and Murdoch had set for the company.
Rapid Growth in the Early Days
Fox News rapidly grew in the late 90’s and the early 2000s, and it became the most-viewed cable television show in 2002. This is a status that it has carried on through the years, with Fox listed as the dominant United States cable news subscription network in most major broadcasting services.
Fox has seen its fair share of controversies throughout the years, in spite of – or perhaps because of – its popularity. Murdoch conceived of the channel as a news outlet for conservatives, but even he couldn’t have predicted what an important gap in the cultural zeitgeist he was looking to fill.
Controversies Around Fox
Some of the controversies that have been assigned to the Fox name include biased reporting in favor of the Republican Party, its politicians, and its political causes. Many have attributed Donald Trump’s 2016 presidential win to Fox News and the conservative propaganda that many say they distribute, though there’s no proof to that theory.
Their conservative rhetoric even led to a lawsuit on the behalf of Dominion Voting Systems being lobbied against the media giant in 2023. Dominion claimed that Fox News reporting on the Big Lie and questioning the validity of their voting machines had damaged their brand, and sued for defamation. Fox News ultimately settled for more than $700 million.
Controversy Around Roger Ailes
One of the most famous controversies surrounding the network involves Roger Ailes. Ailes was the CEO of the company from 1996 until he was ousted in 2016, and the story became a famous tell in the Me Too era of the internet.
Ailes had been accused of sexual harassment dating back to the 80’s, but the most famous reports came in 2016, shortly before he was ousted from Fox News. Former Fox News anchor Gretchen Carlson filed a sexual harassment suit against Ailes, alleging that he had been fired for rebuffing Ailes’ advances when she worked for Fox.
Only the Beginning for Ailes
The report from Carlson was only the beginning regarding the reports that came out around Roger Ailes. More than twenty other female employees ultimately came forward, alleging sexual harassment at various points during his tenure as CEO of Fox, including, famously, journalist and former Fox reporter Megyn Kelly.
Ailes, through his attorney, continued to deny the claims of harassment, even as the allegations against him piled up. Shortly after the initial report against him, though, an announcement through the New York Times revealed that Ailes was going to be fired by the Murdoch’s from his position as CEO, though the ultimate time frame was unclear.
Ailes Leaving Fox
The details of Ailes’ ousting came out later. It was revealed that the Murdoch’s had given Ailes an ultimatum, regarding his status at the company. If he didn’t choose to voluntarily leave by August 1, he would be formally fired, tarnishing his record even more than the allegations already had.
Ailes left Fox on July 21, 2016, and left a significant black mark on the record of Fox. While the viewers of Fox are loyal to the channel, and many believe that the allegations were false – as Ailes continued to repeat up until his death in 2017 – the victims of Ailes have continued to speak out against him and the company in the years since, with a movie titled Bombshell being made, based on the book by Megyn Kelly.
Fox is Incredibly Profitable
Especially in the era of Me Too, and the widespread popularity of social media, it would seem that significant controversy such as sexual harassment and a settled defamation suit would have dimmed Fox’s star, in terms of their profitability and their success as a company.
That’s not the case, though. As of 2023, Fox News Channel generates approximately 70% of its company’s pre-tax profit, and provides a service to 86 countries and territories. It is singularly the most successful cable program in modern television history, and controversies don’t seem to do anything to combat that.
Raking in the Viewership
This makes it unsurprising that the first quarter’s numbers are in for 2024, and Fox has, yet again, come out on top of all the other cable services. In fact, Fox brought in more viewership than liberal streaming services like CNN and MSNBC, combined.
CNN hit a 33-year low this past quarter, only averaging 606,000 viewers during the primetime slot from 7-11 PM ET. MSNBC brought in twice that, with 1.2 million, and Fox News averaged 2 million viewers a night during primetime.
Continuing a Twenty-Year Pattern
This is the 89th straight quarter that Fox has come in on top of the viewership game. Fox ranked first for the first time in the first quarter of 2002, and controversies and changing in presidencies hasn’t dimmed its popularity in the decades since then.
“The Ingraham Angle,” “Jesse Watters Primetime,” “Hannity” and “Gutfeld!” all helped Fox to finish as the most-watched cable news outlet during primetime, and helped to push their general viewership even higher.
Topping Daytime Viewers Too
As far as daytime viewers, Fox trumped the competition again, as well. Fox news averaged 1.3 million total day viewers during Q1, finishing number one in cable as well as the only network to crack the one-million viewer plateau.
MSNBC finished second, with an average audience of 814,000 viewers, and CNN settled for dead last with a measly 467,000 average day viewers. This is the 12th quarter in a row that Fox finished No. 1 among day viewers, continuing their pattern of success.
Massive Successes All Around
“The Five,” with Greg Gutfeld, Jesse Watters, Dana Perino, Jeanine PIrro, and rotating co-hosts Jessica Tarlov and Harold Ford Jr., became the first non-primetime program to ever top cable news for 10 consecutive quarters. The show averaged over 3 million viewers, and finished the quarter as the most-watched program on cable news television.
The success has trickled down the vine, in some cases. Greg Gutfeld recently inked a new deal with Fox News, with the station claiming his weeknight program’s success as the reason behind the deal. His show has increased in viewership by 47% since its initial launch in 2021, and the show pulls in an average of 2.2 million viewers a night.
A Testament to Hard Work and Success
The success of Fox News, while slightly baffling in light of their myriad controversies over the years, is a testament to what can be achieved by someone with a vision and the hard work to ultimately make it happen.
It’s also proof of the mindset of many Americans. While the numbers that liberal outlets are bringing in are nothing to sniff at, the success of conservative outlets like Fox News prove that Americans are searching for a certain story, and it means that liberal outlets are going to have to work that much harder to reach their target audiences.
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