Don Lemon’s CNN This Morning ratings in steady decline since November debut

CNN This Morning’s viewership ratings have continually declined since the show launched three months ago.

The new morning programme, featuring journalists Don Lemon, Poppy Harlow and Kaitlan Collins, kicked off on 1 November.

It premiered just one day after New Day, the show it was intended to replace, concluded on 31 October.

The show already got off to a rocky start, but according to viewing stats from Nielsen, last week CNN This Morning earned its lowest ratings since the show began, averaging 331,000 viewers.

Meanwhile, its competitors Fox & Friends and MSNBC’s Morning Joe drew nearly 1 million and 760,000 viewers apiece across the same time period.

When it first began, CNN This Morning averaged a total of 387,000 viewers. This was six per cent lower on a year-to-date perspective than the series premieres of New Day, which was led by Chris Cuomo and Alisyn Camerota.

CNN’s new CEO Licht said at the time: “I will not allow these changes to affect our position as the world’s leading news source, and we will continue to invest in growth areas.”

Despite Licht’s original decision to reboot the morning programme with handpicked hosts Lemon, Harlow and Collins, the new team have failed to grow the morning show’s viewership.

Even the anchors “seem to be growing frustrated” over the new direction, an insider claimed to The Wrap.

“The show can’t decide strategically what exactly it is, so it’s trying to be everything which can create whiplash for a viewer when segments seem off-brand in tonality,” they said.

“The audience for morning news on network TV is different than the cable news audience and since we’re not gaining new viewers we definitely need to retain our legacy ones.”

The Independent has contacted CNN for comment.