Donald Trump’s interview with Tucker Carlson on X, formerly known as Twitter, got fewer views than the “Baby Shark Dance” video that took the world by storm in 2013. Contrary to the former president’s claims that his interview was “the most watched” interview in history, overall views of the interview were 21.7 million.
That’s a lot of eyeballs, but definitely is not the most-watched interview in history. Trump didn’t even beat his old friend Oprah’s Nielsen ratings extravaganza when she interviewed Michael Jackson in 1993. That interview had more than 62 million views.
Trump should boast, though, that his softball interview with Tucker Carlson got about 8.9 million more viewsthan did the Fox News hosted Republican Party debate (which Trump refused to participate in).
That is a story worth noting, because it helps explain why former President Trump retains such a decisive lead in the ongoing Republican Party Presidential Primary.
More Republican voters want Trump as their nominee, even though he is one of the most flawed candidates in history.
Trump is such a flawed candidate that, thanks to his ongoing legal woes, Trump might be disqualified from ever holding office again if he is found guilty in either the federal grand jury investigation into his purported role in the January 6 riot or the Georgia state grand jury inquiry into allegations that Trump attempted to unduly influence the vote count in Georgia during the 2020 Presidential Election.
The reason that Trump was running around claiming to have gotten 262 million views from his interview was because of the way that X, formerly known as Twitter, counts views for videos. Basically, if you scrolled through your timeline and caught even two-seconds of the Tucker-Trump interview that Carlson posted on his X page, the X algorithm counted you as having watched the interview (which ran for just shy of an hour).
Donald Trump is, of course, the world’s greatest salesman. He has no qualms about inflating his success as a measure for why people should support his candidacy. But it is tiring constantly being made to endure Trump’s realtor-like “selling the dream” to all people, all the time. Especially when Trump’s first term in office had such mixed results in terms of success. Republican voters deserve to have a real Primary in which Trump participates in all events and is made to answer for his mixed record.
Trump won’t give that to them. He’s going to milk his legal situation and ride off the memories of his greatness from eight years ago while fudging the truth about his inevitability as candidate to avoid the tough discussions about his legacy.
And if he does become the nominee, he’ll soon find himself likely in a losing battle with Joe Biden in the General Election.
A 19FortyFive Senior Editor, Brandon J. Weichert is a former Congressional staffer and geopolitical analyst who is a contributor at The Washington Times, as well as at the Asia Times. He is the author of Winning Space: How America Remains a Superpower (Republic Book Publishers), Biohacked: China’s Race to Control Life (Encounter Books), and The Shadow War: Iran’s Quest for Supremacy (July 23). Weichert occasionally serves as a Subject Matter Expert for various organizations, including the Department of Defense. He can be followed via Twitter @WeTheBrandon.
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