What are the Fox News Power Rankings?
The Fox News Power Rankings look back at the previous 15 days of cable coverage of the 2016 election, finding out which candidates and races are the most talked about by Fox News audiences. This year marked the first time that Fox News has used its polling data for its rankings, which are based on its polling data for the week prior to the election. The Fox News Power Rankings reflect cable news coverage of the presidential election for both the major networks (MSNBC and CBS) and the cable news universe as a whole (CNN, Fox Business Network, Fox News Channel, HLN, MSNBC, and Telemundo).
Fox News ratings data for the week prior to the election have been sourced primarily from the University of New Hampshire’s Media Monitor, and the NBC/WSJ polls. For Fox News ratings data for the week of the election, we used Fox News polling data from the NBC/WSJ poll conducted from Sept. 7–12, and the Fox News/Monmouth poll conducted from Oct. 6–11. Data for the month of October comes from the Monmouth poll (Oct. 5–11), the NBC/WSJ poll (Oct. 12–15), and the Fox News poll (Oct. 16–22).
To determine which political candidates are most talked about by Fox News audiences, we considered the number of unique viewers for who was most talked about.
The Fox News Power Rankings — 2016 Edition
*Note: The following descriptions of the top 20 candidates and races are based on the Fox News Power Rankings, the most recent Fox News Poll, and the number of unique viewers for whom data was available.
1. Hillary Clinton: This was the most watched presidential race of 2016 with an average of 1,005,000 unique viewers watching Fox News for her campaign. Clinton led the race with 6,741,000 viewers while Donald Trump had 5,400,000.
2. Trump: Trump was the most talked-about presidential candidate of the 2016 race based on Fox News with 7,823,000 unique viewers watching him. With his rise, the GOP nominee outpaced his Democratic counterpart in the number of unique Fox News viewers talking about him.
3. Ted Cruz: Cruz was the second most talked-about presidential candidate with 5,700,000 viewers watching him. He was followed by Jeb Bush at 3