the town-hall presidential debate between donald trump and hillary clinton might have provided a more fiery battle, but the event couldn<u+2019>t top the first debate in the ratings. about 66.5 million people tuned in to watch the candidates duel sunday at washington university in st. louis, according to nielsen, far less than the record-setting 84 million viewers who watched the sept. 26 contest. anticipation was high for the debate following revelations just days before the matchup of a recording of mr. trump making lewd comments about groping women . but the ratings were more on par with the second debate from 2012, which generated an audience of 65.6 million. sunday<u+2019>s debate went head-to-head with professional football, another bruising american spectacle, which likely reduced viewership for both events. about 16.6 million viewers watched the green bay packers beat the new york giants on nbc<u+2019>s <u+201c>sunday night football,<u+201d> about 26% fewer people than the average for the franchise last season. nbc, which had generated the biggest audience of any network during the first debate, instead pushed debate coverage onto sister networks msnbc and cnbc for the second showdown. the debate was also up against a baseball playoff game between the texas rangers and toronto blue jays. cbs appeared to benefit the most from nbc<u+2019>s debate absence, bringing in about 16.5 million viewers, compared to 11.5 million on abc and 5.6 million on fox. cnn, whose anderson cooper moderated the debate along with abc news<u+2019> martha raddatz, brought in about 11.3 million viewers, beating out the other cable networks. fox news, which had the most cable viewers in the first debate, averaged 9.9 million, and about 5.5 million tuned in on msnbc. the roughly 90-minute debate came during a particularly controversial period during the campaign, as a growing list of republicans backed away from mr. trump after the release of the 2005 video. mr. trump called his remarks in the video <u+201c>locker-room talk<u+201d> that he was not proud of. mrs. clinton said that the video <u+201c>represents exactly who he is.<u+201d> support for mr. trump fell in the wake of the video , according to a new wall street journal/nbc news poll that was conducted before sunday night<u+2019>s debate. like the prior debates, viewership was fragmented across many tv networks and digital platforms like facebook , twitter and youtube, which carried streams of the debate for free and are not counted by traditional nielsen ratings. last week, the candidates<u+2019> running mates brought in 37 million viewers for the vice presidential debate, the least-watched since 2000. mrs. clinton and mr. trump will face off for a final time on oct. 19. many were paying attention to how <u+201c>sunday night football<u+201d> held up against the second presidential debate, particularly at a time when nfl viewership is broadly taking a hit . <u+201c>sunday night football,<u+201d> which has the strongest ratings of any nfl programming franchise, was down significantly this week from its average of 22.5 million viewers last season and about 22 million during the first four weeks of this season. nfl viewership overall was down about 11% for the first four weeks of the season, according to the league, which blamed a confluence of events including interest in the election. the first presidential debate took a bite out of espn<u+2019>s <u+201c>monday night football,<u+201d> which only drew about 8 million viewers that night. <u+2014>matthew futterman contributed to this article. write to steven perlberg at steven.perlberg@wsj.com
tv viewership falls for second presidential debate to 66.5 million - wsj
steven perlberg