Megyn Kelly and her co-host Emily made no effort to hide their delight as they watched CBS News continue its ratings freefall, and honestly, a lot of Americans feel the same way. For years the network lectured viewers from a high horse of left-wing squeals and moralizing, and now ordinary patriots are voting with their remotes. If the mainstream media wants to keep preaching to shrinking audiences, they can do it — but don’t be surprised when the ratings board hands them the bill.
The network’s recent town hall with Erika Kirk, moderated by newly installed CBS personalities, failed to move the needle in any meaningful way: preliminary numbers showed only about 1.5 million viewers, while later tallies crept to 1.9 million with a paltry 265,000 in the coveted 25–54 demo — far below where CBS historically needed to be to command ad dollars. Those figures represented a double-digit drop against the hour’s year-to-date averages, underscoring that viewers simply aren’t tuning in for another round of preachy cable-style programming. The math is brutal: audience attrition is real and it’s hitting the network where it hurts.
Even cultural events that once guaranteed large audiences are underperforming on CBS, proving this is not an isolated problem. The network’s broadcast of the Kennedy Center Honors drew roughly 3.01 million viewers — a steep 25 percent decline from the prior year’s 4.1 million — showing that even star-studded programs can’t paper over a reputation problem. When viewers perceive a network as out of touch, spectacle won’t steady the ship.
Morning programming has been particularly ugly for CBS, with “CBS Mornings” losing large swaths of the audience that once made early slots advertising gold. Ratings across the show slid below the two-million mark and recent reports put demo losses in the 20–30 percent range versus last year, a devastating trend for a time slot built on repeat viewers and habit. When your morning hosts turn the screen into a soapbox instead of a wake-up call for busy Americans, don’t be shocked when they find the audience gone.
The turmoil in the newsroom isn’t helping. Major leadership changes, high-profile departures, and the controversial appointment of new editorial bosses have created headline-grabbing chaos inside CBS, while decisions to pull investigative pieces have fueled claims of editorial interference and cratering trust. That kind of instability is precisely why viewers — and some veteran journalists — are voting with their feet and leaving the network to fend for itself.
For patriotic Americans fed up with condescension from the glass towers of New York and L.A., CBS’s decline is a welcome correction. This isn’t about celebrating failure for its own sake; it’s about accountability — when networks prioritize partisan theater over honest reporting, audiences rebel. Keep watching; when the ratings tumble, advertisers and executives start listening, and that’s the kind of pressure that restores balance and serves the country.
