CBS Republican debate: Highest rating this year

So much for the idea of “debate fatigue”.

Saturday night’s GOP demolition derby on CBS was the highest rated primary debate of 2016, according to overnight Nielsen ratings.

The fiery contest between six Republican contenders easily out-rated the two person Democratic debate earlier in the week, once again affirming that Donald Trump and his GOP rivals are bigger draws than Hillary Clinton and Bernie Sanders.

While the result of the poll conducted by the CBS might be taken seriously by many, it must be kept in mind that these were very few debate watchers invited by GfK’s Knowledge Panel who identified themselves as Republicans or independents.

The 9th GOP debate among the final 6 candidates was watched by 13.5 million viewers on CBS last night. By comparison, the Democrats on Thursday night were watched by 8 million viewers on PBS and CNN.

In August, Fox News’ first Republican primetime debate rocked cable television history, drawing in 24 million viewers – the highest non-sports telecast for a cable network ever.

Viewers spent more than 41 minutes each on average watching CBSN across devices on Saturday, an increase of 23% from the CBS News Democratic debate on November 14, 2015.

CNN’s Wolf Blitzer will moderate the debate; he will be assisted by Telemundo’s Maria Celeste Arrears, Salem radio host Hugh Hewitt and CNN Chief Political Correspondent Dana Bash. Articles featured include reporting on world news, politics, finance, health, entertainment and technology.