Lying about numbers is Donald Trump’s jam. Whether it’s the number of people at his anemic inauguration, the number of cases of COVID-19, or how far he is trailing in the polls, Trump always has the same response: Lie. Just lie. After all, when someone corrects him, he can just lie about that.
On Saturday morning, Trump is entrenched in lying about a new set of numbers—the television ratings for the Democratic and Republican conventions. The numbers are not really in doubt. The RNC lost. Mike Pence lost. Donald Trump lost. Not only did the DNC run up considerably larger numbers for the overall convention, Trump lost out to Biden on his acceptance speech, and Kamala Harris absolutely trounced Pence. A million more people watched Joe Biden deliver an emphatic, powerful acceptance speech that tuned in to hear Trump’s endless drone. Five million more viewers tuned in to hear Kamala Harris than Mike Pence. That’s a massive shellacking.
What’s a Trump to do? Lie, of course. Not only did Trump open up Saturday morning Twitter with claims that the TV viewership was higher for his convention, he went on to dismiss the actual TV ratings with claims that he won if you count digital views. Because Trump’s voters are known to be the kind of young, tech-savvy crowd that does their TV watching online. Not at all a bunch of older, rural voters whose Internet is barely sufficient to bring them the latest announcement from Q. Shocking no one, Fox News rushed to back Trump up—and also shocking no one … they also lied.
As NPR reports, across the four nights of the convention, Democrats notched 86.3 million viewers while while Republicans drew only 77.5 million. But according to Fox News, that number is nothing, because the Republican convention drew a staggering 147.9 views when you add in those watching online, while the DNC convention had a mere 122 million.
So … game, set, and match to Trump! Except. Hmm. Let’s look just a wee bit more closely. Where did Fox get that massive number—a number that says an amazing 70 million people were streaming the Republican convention? Twice the number of those who streamed the DNC? Well…
The Republican National Convention brought in 147.9 million total views across television and online between Monday and the end of Thursday night's programming, according to a senior campaign official.
Emphasis added. The report that half of all Republicans are streaming demons was a self-reported claim, made after it was clear that the television ratings for the Republicans were much lower than those for the DNC. Trump is citing Fox as proof. Foxis citing Trump as proof. And if there was any justice in the world they would both disappear in a puff of circular logic.
The truth is that Trump is obsessive about the actual TV ratings. He regularly flings out ratings numbers as supposed “proof” that polls are wrong about the popularity of his positions or campaign. And this time those ratings showed that his convention came in a sorry second, despite damaging a national monument, turning the White House into an advertising billboard, and blasting fireworks over the Washington Monument.
So of course Trump has to lie about it. Especially to himself. Because this has to be just breaking his little heart.
