Entertainment

Trump reaches 45.6 million viewers for speech

31 of January 2018

President Donald Trump gestures as delivers his first State of the Union address in the House chamber of the U.S. Capitol to a joint session of Congress Tuesday, Jan. 30, 2018 in Washington, as Vice President Mike Pence and House Speaker Paul Ryan applaud. (Win McNamee/Pool via AP),President Donald Trump gestures as delivers his first State of the Union address in the House chamber of the U.S. Capitol to a joint session of Congress Tuesday, Jan. 30, 2018 in Washington, as Vice President Mike Pence and House Speaker Paul Ryan applaud. (Win McNamee/Pool via AP)

President Trump's first State of the Union address was seen by 45.6 million people. The Nielsen company says that was down from the 47.7 million who saw Trump's address to Congress last February. Trump's predecessor, Barack Obama, reached a larger audience for his first State of the Union in 2010.

NEW YORK (AP) — President Donald Trump reached an audience of 45.6 million people for his first State of the Union address, not enough to give him bragging rights over his predecessor.

The Nielsen company said former President Barack Obama drew 48 million people for his first State of the Union in 2010.

Trump’s audience was down from the 47.7 million people who watched his address to the joint session of Congress last February.

Fox News Channel earned the top spot among the individual networks, with 11.5 million viewers during the speech. It was the first time that Fox News, home of Trump-friendly opinion hosts like Sean Hannity, beat all of the networks for the State of the Union, although Fox also was the network of choice for Trump’s address to Congress last February.

NBC (7.1 million) and CBS (7 million) fought for second place. The Fox broadcast network had 3.6 million, CNN had 3.1 million and MSNBC had 2.7 million, Nielsen said.