Trump reaches 45.6 million viewers for speech

NEW YORK (AP) - President Donald Trump reached an audience of 45.6 million people for his first State of the Union address, not enough to give him bragging rights over his predecessor.

The Nielsen company said former President Barack Obama drew 48 million people for his first State of the Union in 2010.

Trump's audience was down from the 47.7 million people who watched his address to the joint session of Congress last February.

Fox News Channel earned the top spot among the individual networks, with 11.5 million viewers during the speech. It was the first time that Fox News, home of Trump-friendly opinion hosts like Sean Hannity, beat all of the networks for the State of the Union, although Fox also was the network of choice for Trump's address to Congress last February.

NBC (7.1 million) and CBS (7 million) fought for second place. The Fox broadcast network had 3.6 million, CNN had 3.1 million and MSNBC had 2.7 million, Nielsen said.