Trump asking for advice on Stormy Daniels situation

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32. Fortune story from March 2016

How Media Giants Are Profiting from Donald Trump's Ascent

There has been much debate over the media’s relationship with Donald Trump. But, there is little doubt that the bombastic and controversial GOP frontrunner has dominated the airwaves throughout the 2016 election cycle—and television networks have reaped huge ratings boosts as a result.

Last week, CNN president Jeff Zucker said that the news media is not the culprit for Trump’s ascent and that networks like his own are simply doing their job in covering a leading presidential candidate. According to media analyst Andrew Tyndall, Trump was the second most-covered story of 2015, after “winter weather,” and the amount of coverage afforded to Trump in the 2016 election cycle accounts for nearly a third of all election coverage and more than all Democratic candidates combined.

Meanwhile, tonight in Washington, D.C., CNN hosts what could be described as one of the biggest ratings grabs in recent election-season memory. While previous debates and town halls have focused on one political party at a time, the network is hosting a three-hour special featuring live individual interviews with all five remaining candidates in both parties.
Record ratings, record advertising revenues

For TV networks, the “Trump effect” has meant higher television ratings for all election coverage in general and, in particular, a higher profile and record ratings for the 21 debates held so far by the two parties. Ratings for some of those debates have been so high—with, in some cases, more than four times as many viewers tuning in as did for debates during the 2012 election—that networks have been able to hike their advertising rates well into six-digit territory for a 30-second ad.

CNN, for example, was reportedly able to charge roughly 40 times its typical primetime rate of $5,000 for a 30-second ad spot during its September debate.