CNN anchor Jake Tapper’s The Lead with Jake Tapper has hit a grim milestone, averaging just 525,000 viewers from April 28 to May 25, 2025, its lowest ratings since August 2015, according to Nielsen Media Research. The 25% drop from last year’s audience, reported by Fox News, coincides with Tapper’s high-profile book tour for Original Sin: President Biden’s Decline, Its Cover-Up, and His Disastrous Choice to Run Again, co-authored with Axios’ Alex Thompson. Critics argue Tapper’s attempt to expose a Biden White House scandal has alienated his core liberal viewers while failing to win over Trump supporters, exposing a miscalculated bid to boost his profile at the cost of credibility.
The book, alleging a cover-up of Joe Biden’s cognitive decline, has generated buzz but not viewers. Tapper’s whirlwind publicity tour—spanning podcasts, talk shows, and even MSNBC—leaned heavily on CNN’s platform, yet The Lead captured only 11% of the cable news audience share, trailing MSNBC’s 21% and Fox News’s 68%, per Nielsen. Fox’s The Five and Special Report with Bret Baier averaged 3.3 million viewers, dwarfing Tapper’s numbers. A 15% drop in the 25-54 demographic, down to 95,000 viewers, further signals a collapse in advertiser appeal, per The Daily Mail.
Tapper’s critics contend he betrayed his audience by pivoting to a narrative aligning with conservative critiques of Biden, hoping to sell books to Trump supporters. The strategy backfired: Trump’s base, long distrustful of Tapper for his perceived liberal bias, has shunned the book, with conservative commentators like Megyn Kelly slamming his past dismissal of Biden’s health concerns, per USA Today. Meanwhile, liberal viewers, stung by Tapper’s admission of underreporting Biden’s decline, feel misled. Jon Stewart, on The Daily Show, accused CNN of hyping a story “they should’ve told you a year ago for free,” per The Guardian.
Tapper’s defenders, including a CNN spokesperson, argue Nielsen’s U.S.-centric metrics miss The Lead’s global reach via CNN International and Max streaming, per Mediaite. They point to his journalistic rigor, noting the book’s fact-checking by a former New Yorker editor, per Yahoo News. Tapper himself expressed “humility” about his Biden coverage, admitting on The Megyn Kelly Show that conservative media was “correct” about the issue, a stance that hasn’t quelled backlash from either side.
The ratings slump reflects broader challenges for CNN, which saw a 13% primetime viewership drop year-over-year and profits below $1 billion in 2024, per The New York Times. Tapper’s book tour, meant to bolster his stature, instead highlighted his role in a media establishment distrusted by 69% of Americans, per a 2025 Pew poll. His apology to Lara Trump for a 2020 interview dispute, reported by Fox News, further muddied his image, alienating liberals without winning conservatives.
As Trump’s second term dominates with tariffs, deportations, and pardons, Tapper’s focus on Biden’s past has left him out of step with viewers craving forward-looking analysis. The gamble to court a broader audience through Original Sin has cost him his base, proving that in a polarized media landscape, straddling ideological lines can lead to irrelevance.
