President Donald Trump can now boast that he has the most watched impeachment vote in history.
According to Nielsen data, more than 16 million TV viewers watched Trump become only the third White House occupant to be impeached by the House of Representatives on Wednesday.
While that figure may be underwhelming for a major historic event, it does top the audience who watched the House impeach former President Bill Clinton in 1998. The impeachment inquiry of former President Richard Nixon in the 1970s never went to a full House vote.
From 8 to 9 p.m. Eastern time, when the House vote on Trump was completed, Fox News led with an average of 5.03 million viewers tuned in, according to Nielsen data. NBC, the only broadcast network to cover the proceedings for the full hour, averaged 4.97 million viewers, followed by MSNBC's 3.24 million viewers, and CNN's 2.83 million.
CBS and ABC interrupted their regular prime-time programming with brief special reports on the vote. Both networks had heavily promoted entertainment programs scheduled on the night _ the "Survivor" season finale on CBS and a live presentation of two classic Norman Lear-produced sitcoms on ABC.
Coverage was also shown on PBS, C-SPAN and a wide array of online streaming platforms.
The outcome of the Democratic-controlled House vote was a virtual certainty, which likely kept the impeachment proceedings from being a must-watch event.
Democrats accused Trump of abusing his oath of office when he asked Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskiy to investigate former Vice President Joe Biden and his son while Trump was withholding a promised White House meeting and crucial military aid to the vulnerable U.S. ally.
A second article of impeachment accused Trump of obstructing Congress' investigation into the alleged scheme by refusing to release subpoenaed documents or allow current and former aides to testify.
The Democratic-led House voted 230-197 on the first article and approved the second article 229-198.
The lack of drama was similar to the last televised vote on impeachment on Dec. 19, 1998. About 12 million viewers watched an NFL game between the New York Jets and the Buffalo Bills on CBS, which was more than the total of all the cable and broadcast networks combined that carried the House vote to impeach Clinton. The vote by the Republican-led House was expected as was Clinton's acquittal in the Senate in February 1999.
Fox News tucked in special coverage of the impeachment vote into its regular prime-time lineup. After the vote, analysis was presented by its conservative hosts Tucker Carlson, Sean Hannity and Laura Ingraham, who have been highly critical of the impeachment process and the news media's handling of it. Fox News also showed Trump's rally in Battle Creek, Mich., on a split screen during the vote.
The opinion-fused coverage was a departure for Fox News, as the conservative channel typically has its nonpartisan journalists handle special events such as presidential addresses, major House votes and elections.
While Fox News chief Washington anchor Bret Baier delivered the news of the vote, coverage was handed off to the prime-time hosts, who took over for the rest of the night.
