More Than 19 Million Watched Jan. 6 Hearing, Early Tally Shows

The first prime-time hearing of the House Select Committee was watched by more than 19 million people.

The number will grow as more networks are counted and out-of- home viewing is included. The final number of viewers is expected to be released on Friday evening.

Committee members and Democrats wanted to make the case to the biggest audience possible by scheduling a congressional hearing for 8 to 10 p.m. ABC, CBS and NBC covered their prime-time programming live.

The Thursday night figure pales in comparison to presidential debates (63 million to 73 million) or this year's State of the Union address (38 million), but it's still larger than a daytime congressional hearing. It is in the vicinity of television events such as the Macy's Thanksgiving Day Parade.

ABC had more viewers than any other broadcast network. CBS had an audience of more than 3 million. CNN had an average audience of 2.6 million.

The majority of viewers stayed around for the whole congressional proceeding. There was no change in viewership between 8 and 10 p.m.

While the broadcast networks gave up their prime-time entertainment offerings, CNN and MSNBC gave the hearing wall-to-wall coverage. Fox News didn't show the hearings live, instead showing its usual prime time lineup.

Tucker Carlson and Sean Hannity devoted their shows to January 6th and spent two hours belittling the committee's work.

Mr. Carlson said that the hearings were insane. This is the only time a news channel in the US will not broadcast live. We will not help them do it. We want to tell you the truth.

The audience for Fox's counterprogramming was three million.

Baier and MacCallum did cover the hearings live, but they did so on Fox Business, which has a lower audience. More than 200,000 people watched the hearings. 1.3 million people watched Mr. Baier and Ms. MacCallum switch over to Fox News.

The local affiliates of the Fox broadcast network were not required to pick up the Fox Business feed. Los Angeles and Chicago were among the major Fox affiliates that took the feed. In the New York market, Fox chose to run episodes of "MasterChef Junior" and "Don't Forget the Lyrics."