67 Million People Watched Trump-Harris Debate

More than 67 million people watched the presidential debate between Vice President Kamala Harris and former President Donald Trump on Tuesday, according to Nielsen ratings.

Those figures are a massive increase over the 51 million who tuned in to the debate between Trump and President Joe Biden on June 27, an event that became the catalyst for the end of Biden’s reelection campaign.

The totals account for viewership across a range of television networks. ABC hosted the debate, but it was simulcast on 17 networks, including CBS, Fox News, NBC and MSNBC. Nielsen said Wednesday that the majority of viewers (41.3 million) were 55 and older.

The numbers are much lower than some of the peak debate showdowns in recent political history. In 2016, the first debate between former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton and Trump drew 84 million viewers. The first debate between Trump and Biden brought in 73 million people.

The highly anticipated event was the first time Harris and Trump had ever met and comes just two month before November’s election. Even conservative pundits agreed that Trump had a rough night — pointing to his lies about Haitian migrants eating dogs and his obsession with crowd sizes.

The former president’s Republican allies, however, have insisted that Trump will win the election, saying the debate wouldn’t move the needle against him.

Trump suggested Wednesday he’s unlikely to do another debate with Harris. He told reporters in the spin room after Tuesday’s matchup that he felt he won the debate and told Fox News the following morning he was “less inclined” to face off against Harris again “because we had a great night.”

“I think it was one of my best debates, maybe my best debate,” Trump told Fox.

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