Politics

GOP Presidential candidate Rick Santorum swept the two caucuses and one primary last night in Colorado, Missouri and Minnesota. This morning he made the TV news rounds… sort of.

Santorum appeared on Fox News Channel’s “Fox & Friends,” MSNBC’s “Morning Joe” and CNN’s “Starting Point,” but not any of the three network morning shoes on NBC, ABC or CBS.

Why is that significant? The lowest-rated network morning show, “CBS This Morning” averaged more total viewers in January than “Starting Point,” “Fox & Friends” and “Morning Joe” combined. ABC and NBC have substantially more viewers than CBS.

Why would Santorum forgo the popular network morning shows for the less-watched cable programs? The New York Times’ Brian Stelter probably has the right idea:

Seems notable that Santorum went on all the cable morning shows today, but not Today, GMA or CBS. Wanted to reach insiders, not avg voters?

— Brian Stelter (@brianstelter) February 8, 2012

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Voters in three states — Colorado, Minnesota and Missouri — will weigh in today on the 2012 GOP Presidential nominee. In a departure from recent political coverage, cable networks are scaling back for this round of voting — a primary in Missouri, which is non-binding in the first place, and caucuses in Colorado and Minnesota.

Fox News will feature regular primetime programming, with live updates from Bret Baier at the top and bottom of every hour. Baier will also anchor a one-hour special at 11pmET.

MSNBC’s regular prime time anchors — Chris Matthews, Al Sharpton, Ed Schultz, Rachel Maddow and Lawrence O’Donnell — will fold election coverage into their respective regularly scheduled programs.

CNN is changing up its regular lineup with Wolf Blitzer and Anderson Cooper anchoring special coverage beginning at 7pmET from Atlanta. Blitzer Tweeted this picture of how he spent his Monday night in Atlanta.

GOP candidate for president Newt Gingrich, who has gotten some significant mileage out of the televised debates this primary cycle, may not be finished debating. But the networks that hand over precious air time, may be. Toward the end of today’s Washington Post story on Gingrich‘s plans going forward, there is a line about the Gingrich campaign looking toward more debates.

His strategists are also lobbying two networks — Fox News and ABC — to add debates to the schedule between now and March.

But those networks say that’s not the case. Fox News tells us no one from Gingrich’s team has lobbied them. And we’re told it’s unlikely Fox News will have another debate for the remainder of the GOP primary season. ABC tells us no one has lobbied them either, but a standing invitation is out to the candidates to debate on “This Week.”

The next debates are tentatively set for February 22, in Arizona on CNN;
March 1 in Georgia also on CNN; and March 5 in California on NBC.

Considering there were about 10,000 fewer Nevada GOP caucus-goers this year than in 2008, that may tell you a little something about TV viewer interest in the proceedings. Here are the Nielsen viewership averages between 10pmET, when the polls closed, and MidnightET. (Total Viewers / A25-54 demo):

• FNC – 1.334M /  244K

• CNN – 631K / 231K

• MSNBC – 418K / 187K

It should be noted the networks produced live programming before 10pmET. Also, MSNBC returned to regular programming at 11pm, while CNN and Fox News continued with Nevada coverage. We’ll have the final numbers tomorrow morning.

Compared to the other Saturday caucus held this year, South Carolina, January 21, the networks are down significantly. Verses the 7-10pm average during South Carolina coverage, FNC was down -122%, CNN was down -100% and MSNBC was also down 100% in viewership.

And while CNN and Fox News saw an increase in ratings vs. a typical Saturday night. MSNBC’s average of 418K/187K drew fewer viewers than normal Saturday programming, “Lockup”

MSNBC has taken out another full page ad in the Sunday New York Times, this time tying together the Super Bowl and 2012 Election coverage.

A few weeks ago, MSNBC ran an ad — criticized by some — promoting “Morning Joe” as “The Most Influential Political Show in America.” A week later, there were dueling full page ads from MSNBC and CBS ahead of the launch of “CBS This Morning.”

Today’s ad features Rachel Maddow, who has been anchoring MSNBC’s caucus and primary nights, except last night when Michael Smerconish and Chris Matthews had Nevada duty.

The networks have not yet announced plans for Tuesday’s Colorado and Minnesota caucuses. But the ratings for Florida’s primary showed channels like Fox News and MSNBC actually perform better with regular programming, while CNN, which ranks third in primetime, has experienced significant tune in on primary nights — up 75% last Tuesday during Florida coverage, from its Monday average.

After another Mitt Romney primary win — this time at the Nevada Caucuses — Newt Gingrich decided to hold a press conference, instead of a second-place-ain’t-so-bad speech. It was carried live on CNN and Fox News. (MSNBC signed off at 11pmET airing “Lockup: New Mexico.”) A defiant Gingrich brushed off rumors he’ll be dropping out, saying he’s in it until the convention in Tampa. Gingrich says he’ll be able to stay in it state-by-state, because his is a national campaign: “If I am on ‘Hannity’, or I am happy to be in the Associated Press, or if I’m on one of the networks or even in The New York Times that in fact it reaches the whole country.”

At one point during his Q&A, Gingrich cited Fox News contributor Charles Krauthammer‘s comments about  Mitt Romney not quite understanding “conservative philosophy.”

After the newser, Krauthammer told Bret Baier, “I appreciate the shout out but it will not work.” And summing up the news conference, Krauhammer added, “That was the best of Newt and the worst of Newt.”

Stephen Hayes agreed: “This is what flailing looks like. It was not a pretty performance by Newt Gingrich.”

As CNN waited for Gingrich, they kept their Caucus Cam trained on a late gathering of GOP voters, held after sundown to accommodate Orthodox Jews and Seventh Day Adventists. One Caucus-goer, a Ron Paul supporter, bemoaned Paul’s perceived lack of media coverage, even claiming he’s been poorly lit at the debates. “I’ve looked at some of the debates and when they go on Ron Paul, the lighting is dimmer, sometimes they don’t even allow him to talk, they don’t even get him into the conversations,” the woman said, live on CNN. “It’s just hideous how the media has been handling this entire thing.”

Gingrich also revealed he’ll be rooting for the Giants later today. As a Green Bay Packer shareholder — his son-in-law hails from Sheboygan — Gingrich decided it was best to root for the team that beat the Packers on the road to the Super Bowl.

The fight for the Republican Presidential nomination continues tomorrow in Nevada, and as usual, the cable networks will be there.

MSNBC’s coverage will run from 6-10:30pmET. The first two hours will be hosted by MSNBC political analyst Michael Smerconish. Chris Matthews will take over from the DC bureau at 8pmET.

CNN’s live coverage will run from 7-10pmET and will be anchored by Wolf Blitzer, Anderson Cooper and John King. At 11pmET, Don Lemon will anchor a live edition of “Newsroom.”

Fox News will stick with a regular Saturday night schedule in the early part of primetime — “Huckabee” at 8pmET, followed by “Justice with Judge Janine.” At 10pmET, Bret Baier will host a one-hour live special on the caucus results. Baier will also provide extended live cut-ins during the rest of primetime programming.

Matt Lauer stayed behind in New York today while his “Today” family was in Indianapolis ahead of the Super Bowl Sunday. Lauer will be at the White House this weekend for the annual live pre-game presidential interview.

Bill O’Reilly did it last year on FOX. Katie Couric, then with CBS, conducted the pre-game interview in 2010 arriving just ahead of that year’s Snowpocalypse. And Lauer, whose contract with NBC ends later this year, conducted an interview in 2009, a couple weeks after Obama took office, but not without some “technical difficulties.”

At 3:45pmET, MSNBC, CNN and Fox News went live to the Donald Trump press conference in Las Vegas, where the real estate mogul — and frequent cable news guest — endorsed Mitt Romney for President.

The Trump endorsement has been fodder for cable news all day, with early reports speculating that former Speaker of the House Newt Gingrich would get the nod. Citing “sources with knowledge of the endorsement,” CNN was the first to confirm that Trump would actually endorse Romney.

Trump called in to Fox News for a phone interview with Neil Cavuto after the press conference was through.

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Fox News easily won the cable news coverage of the Florida GOP primary, drawing more than the combined average of CNN and MSNBC. But the early finish of the primary, with the call at 8pmET going to Mitt Romney, may have sent viewers elsewhere. Of the three cable news networks, only CNN actually improved upon a regular night. In fact, Fox News and MSNBC had higher viewership Monday night, than they did Tuesday night, as first noted by Brian Stelter.

Fox News averaged 2.53 million viewers between 8-11pm Monday night, and 2.51 million last night. MSNBC averaged 1.12 million Monday and 984,000 last night.

This says a few things: the early call drove viewers elsewhere, national interest in state primaries may be waning and FNC and MSNBC’s loyal viewers would have preferred to watch a regularly scheduled “O’Reilly Factor” or “Rachel Maddow Show” than election returns.

CNN placed second to Fox News during primetime, drawing 1.09 million viewers, up from an average of 622,000 Monday night. By comparison, here’s how the broadcast networks fared: FOX — 7.5 million, CBS — 10.62, ABC — 5.54, NBC — 4.83.

Mitt Romney watches Florida election results on CNN about a half hour before he was declared winner of the GOP primary