Dem debate audience drops by nearly half

Slightly more than half as many people watched Saturday night’s Democratic presidential debate as tuned into the party’s debate in October, according to preliminary ratings reported by multiple outlets.

{mosads}The CBS debate captured 8.5 million viewers, a sliver of the audience for previous debates this cycle. The first Democratic debate, in October, averaged 15.3 million viewers.

Even that was less than the viewership of the early Republican debates.

An estimated 24 million people tuned into the first GOP debate on Fox News in August, followed by roughly 23 million at the second debate on CNN in September. Subsequent Republican debates have reached progressively smaller audiences.

The timing of the second Democratic debate — during prime time on a Saturday, when many people are not watching television — likely contributed to the relatively low ratings.

The American public also may feel that drama is missing from the Democratic contests, given former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton’s dominating poll numbers and the few other participants onstage. The main Republican debates, in contrast, featured eight to 10 candidates each, and were aided with the fiery comments of billionaire Donald Trump, who has taken credit for the high ratings.