ABC's “World News Tonight” anchor David Muir may have driven away some viewers after the Disney-owned network Angry conservatives During last week's presidential debate.
Muir and co-host Linsey Davis Fact-checking former President Donald Trump five times without correcting Vice President Kamala Harris, leading many conservatives to suggest the debate was not fair. Susan B. Anthony Pro-Life America even demanded a correction after Davis made an abortion claim during the debate, which the group described as “100% false.”
Muir’s “World News Tonight” averaged 6.7 million viewers across the three post-debate episodes, Wednesday, Thursday and Friday, compared with an average of 7.6 million in 2024 before the debate.
When comparing ABC's three post-debate episodes to year-over-year totals, “World News Tonight's” 12% drop in viewers is more significant than the slight declines at “CBS Evening News” and “NBC Nightly News,” though Muir's newscast remains the No. 1 aired evening newscast.
Although it is unclear whether Trump supporters shut down ABC's newscast immediately following the debate, The former president has described it as “one-sided”. Trump told Fox News that he believed various claims by Harris should have been fact-checked.
“David Muir should have questioned every single one of them, I've lost a lot of respect for him. Everybody has lost respect for him,” Trump said last week.
He added, “It was very … one-sided. It was one versus three.”
Davis acknowledged in a post-debate interview that Trump's fact-checking was influenced by CNN the debate that went on Devastating for President Biden In June.
“People were concerned that the statements were allowed to languish and not [be] That was disputed by either candidate Biden or the moderator at the time.” Davis said This was stated by the Los Angeles Times last week.
On Sunday, ABC News' Martha Raddatz even suggested Harris was wrong when she said “there is not a single member of the United States military that is on active duty in any combat zone around the world.”
“Our fact-checkers determined this was false,” Raddatz said.
“There are 900 U.S. military personnel in Syria right now, 2,500 U.S. troops in Iraq. All are under regular threat of drones and missiles for months. We're also conducting operations in the Red Sea,” Raddatz added. “In addition, every single day, Navy SEALs, Delta Force special operators could be part of any number of lethal attacks.”
Muir and Davis failed to correct Harris in front of a massive debate audience of nearly 70 million people.
Fox News Digital's Hannah Panrek contributed to this report.
