Media company Fox Corporation FOXFOXA is proposing another presidential debate for the 2024 election.
The proposal comes after President Joe Biden has dropped out of the race and would allow voters to view two presidential debates between Donald Trump and Kamala Harris.
What Happened: Fox could be a winner in the 2024 election with viewers tuning in to Fox News for political commentary and interviews during the current political cycle. The media company also benefits from increased advertising spending during the election cycle.
A new proposal for a third 2024 presidential debate could also benefit Fox.
Fox News invited Kamala Harris and Donald Trump to appear at a presidential debate in Pennsylvania on Sept. 17, as reported by Politico. Invitations were sent out to both candidates on Wednesday.
The debate would take place one week after a proposed second debate on Sept. 10. This debate was to be hosted by Walt Disney Co DIS-owned ABC News and originally scheduled to include Biden and Trump.
While it proposed Pennsylvania and the date of Sept. 17, Fox News is said to be open to discussions with the two campaign teams on the date, location and other items such as having a live audience. Robert F. Kennedy Jr. was not listed as an invite to the debate in the report.
Trump has committed to debating Harris in the past few days and had previously pushed for Fox News to host a debate.
Why It's Important: With less than four months to go before election day and the late departure of Biden in the race, debates between Harris and Trump could generate strong viewership.
The first 2024 presidential debate was watched by over 47 million viewers and set records for host CNN, which is a unit of Warner Bros. Discovery WBD.
CNN hosted the debate, but also allowed networks to simulcast their live feed. This resulted in Fox News having the most viewers (8.82 million) for the debate and beating CNN (8.75 million), according to initial reports.
Fox also generated 3.48 million viewers on the FOX broadcast network and over 370,000 viewers on Fox Business.
The two 2020 presidential debates also saw Fox News lead the way in viewership. The two debates were not hosted by an individual network and broadcast widely by media networks.
Viewership for the first 2024 presidential debate was down from 73 million viewers and 84 million viewers for the 2020 and 2016 first presidential debates, respectively.
The debate between Harris and Trump could see increased viewership as they did not previously take each other on in a presidential debate and more undecided voters could want to hear more about Harris' policies going forward.
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