Fox News Sets Record with RNC Coverage, But Other Networks Fail to Keep Pace

Fox News set a record during its delivery of the first night of the Republican National Convention, according to early Nielsen data, the network said. Monday evening marked the highest rated first night of a convention for an individual cable network, Fox News said.

The convention drew a lackluster audience at other networks, and fewer eyeballs on TV than did last week's opening night of the Democratic National Convention.

When the numbers are added up across Fox News, CNN, MSNBC, ABC, CBS and NBC, the Republicans drew about 15.8 million viewers while the Democrats drew 18.7 million on their respective first nights. With Fox News getting 7.06 million viewers during its coverage of RNC's convention, it garnered a hefty 45 percent of the total audience.

The numbers don't include digital streaming, but they indicate a TV audience of about 30 percent less than the first day of the Republican convention four years earlier. The Democratic convention experienced a similar drop in TV ratings last week.

Monday's highlight, based on next-day reaction, was a speech delivered with passion — and volume — by former Fox News personality Kimberly Guilfoyle, the girlfriend of Donald Trump Jr.

Included in Guilfoyle's remarks was a denunciation of California, which is especially newsworthy given the state is run by her ex-husband, Governor Gavin Newsom.

"If you want to see the socialist Biden/Harris future for our country, just take a look at California," Guilfoyle said. "It is a place of immense wealth, immeasurable innovation and immaculate environment – and the Democrats turned it into a land of discarded heroin needles in parks, riots in streets and blackouts in homes."

While Republicans applauded her blunt and intense delivery, famously liberal Hollywood was quick to rebuke her, with Stephen Colbert leading the charge on his The Late Show.

"I've tried to look at California, but there's fire everywhere because of climate change," Colbert said. "By the way, her ex-husband is the governor of California. I'm guessing that was not an amicable split. But I think I know who was awarded custody of the rage, because when it came to the president's agenda, she had some very nuanced screams."

All the publicity is helping Guilfoyle's six-minute speech go viral, with all of the networks posting their versions online and many more on YouTube, where PBS NewsHour boasts 235,000 views of its version and The Hill has 120,000 for its, numbers that rival First Lady Michelle Obama's YouTube audience for her speech on the first night of last week's Democratic National Convention.