Meet the Press Nabs Biggest Ratings In More Than a Year With Trump Interview

NBC News

NBC News’ Meet the Press brought in more than 2.9 million viewers on Sunday in an episode centered around moderator Kristen Welker interviewing President-elect Donald Trump.

The Dec. 8 episode was the number one “public affairs show” on Sunday and it earned its largest audience in over a year, as well as its biggest win in the key 25-54 demo in more than two years. According to Nielsen ratings, Meet the Press averaged 569,000 in the 25-54 demo, leading both ABC and CBS by more than 100,000 viewers. Between Meet the Press, ABC’s The Week, and CBS’ Face the Nation, Meet the Press is the only show to post year-to-year gains.

The full interview with Trump — which earned rave reviews for Welker — also nabbed more than 2.3 million views on YouTube.

In Welker’s interview, Trump made a number of statements that have earned pushback and kicked off debate, including saying he’s open to prosecuting President Joe Biden, announcing he’ll be pardoning Jan. 6 Capitol rioters on “day one,” and continuing to refuse to concede the 2020 presidential election, which the Republican lost to Biden.

At the end of their interview, Trump accused Welker, who pushed back throughout the interview, of being “nasty” and “hostile” towards him and claimed she was nicer to Biden, to which the Meet the Press moderator had to inform him she’d never interviewed Biden.

“You know, the answers to questions are, you know, pretty nasty, but, but look, because I’ve seen you interview other people like Biden,” he said.

“I’ve never interviewed President Biden,” Welker replied.

“I’m talking metaphorically,” Trump said.