The Fox News Channel keeps losing its on-air personalities to the Trump administration, but that hasn’t stopped the network from crushing the cable-news competition.
The latest milestone: Since the Nov. 5 election, Fox News has notched the top 1,013 cable news telecasts, according to the network.
The first non-Fox program on the list is the March 24 episode of MSNBC’s “The Rachel Maddow Show,” which came in at 1,014th.
That dominance comes even though Fox News has watched nearly two dozen current and former personalities or staffers take positions in the Trump administration, according to the Newsweek tally.
Number 23 was Jeanine Pirro, a longtime Fox News regular and co-host of “The Five,” the highest-rated show in cable news. Mr. Trump announced Thursday that he has picked the former county judge and prosecutor to serve as interim U.S. Attorney for the District of Columbia.
Before joining “The Five” in 2022, Ms. Pirro hosted “Justice with Judge Jeanine” from 2011 to 2022.
“Jeanine is incredibly well qualified for this position, and is considered one of the Top District Attorneys in the History of the State of New York. She is in a class by herself. Congratulations Jeanine!” Mr. Trump said in a Thursday post on Truth Social.
Her nomination came after the withdrawal of interim U.S. Attorney Ed Martin, who was moved to the Department of Justice’s Office of Pardon Attorney after his prospects for Senate confirmation fizzled last week.
Fox News Channel has top 1,000 cable news telecasts since Election Day | Fox News https://t.co/PctMBqUDpd
— Wyatt Dobrovich (@WyattDobrovich) May 9, 2025
Ms. Pirro may be one of the network’s most recognizable faces, but so far Fox has shown it can withstand the loss of its stars without losing its ratings dominance.
Since the election, Fox News has drawn 66% of primetime viewers of cable news programming and 65% of total-day viewers, while MSNBC attracted 20% of the total-day audience and 22% in primetime.
In third place is CNN, which has attracted 12% of primetime viewers and 14% of total-day viewers since the election, according to Nielsen Media Research figures.
The week of April 28-May 4 represented another big week for Fox. The network again handily outpaced CNN and MSNBC while threatening the supremacy of the broadcast networks, which are carried by the public airwaves and appear in most homes without a cable subscription.
For example, Fox News Channel drew 2.9 million viewers in weekday primetime, more than NBC with 2.5 million viewers.
Fox has been the most-watched cable news channel for the last 23 years, a record the network is on pace to extend despite the recent departures.
The most notable figures are Pete Hegseth, a former “Fox & Friends” co-host who now serves as defense secretary, and Sean Duffy, a former co-host of Fox Business’s “The Bottom Line” who heads the Department of Transportation.
The Newsweek list of on-air contributors who left the network since the election to serve in the administration includes border czar Tom Homan; U.S. Ambassador to the Vatican Mike Huckabee; Sara Carter, director of the Office of National Drug Control Policy; Morgan Ortagus, deputy special envoy to the Middle East; and Leo Terrell, senior counsel to the Assistant Attorney General for Civil Rights.
In addition, the Trump administration figures who had worked for Fox in previous years include FBI deputy director Dan Bongino; Director of National Intelligence Tulsi Gabbard; U.S. Ambassador to Greece Kimberly Guilfoyle; and Michael Waltz, former national security advisor and current nominee for U.S. ambassador to the United Nations.
