Trump’s 2024 announcement was downplayed on cable TV

It wasn’t must-watch TV.

Donald Trump’s prime-time declaration that he was running for president for the third consecutive year was ignored by news outlets and only partially aired on CNN and Fox News Channel.

The year-old president, 76, ended months of speculation about throwing his hat back in the ring and announced his intention to get his old job back in front of hundreds of cheering supporters in his resort town of Mar-a-Lago.

A week after 22 midterm Republican candidates backed by the would-be GOP kingmaker lost their elections, the nation’s three major television networks picked up the historic announcement and began airing reality dating shows and crime dramas, according to the Washington Post .

Political observers surfing the airwaves hoping to hear the 76-year-old’s speech instead watched shows like Bachelor in Paradise on ABC and sci-fi drama La Brea on NBC.

The broadcast news channels all ran live reports from Mar-a-Lago during their evening newscasts several hours before Trump took the microphone.

On cable TV, CNN – which was criticized in 2016 for covering the aspiring candidate’s rowdy rallies in full – broadcast the first 25 minutes of the announcement to cover the deadly missile attack in Poland, while Fox also cut the more than hour-long speech before it it was completed, the report said.

CNN’s relative snub came just days after Trump bizarrely declared that the news network should go conservative and “just have me on it.”

MSNBC chose not to prejudge “Alex Wagner Tonight,” leaving far-right outlet Newsmax as the only high-profile cable network to televise the speech in its entirety.

A representative for the controversial Republican, who is the subject of multiple federal criminal investigations, said Trump’s reduced airtime was an act of repression.

“They don’t want the American people to hear directly from the greatest leader of the greatest political movement in our history, so I suspect they will try to censor and cut off,” Liz Harrington told Real America’s Voice.

The speech was streamed online in its entirety from CSPAN and other sites.

Trump promised to make “America great and glorious against” in his meandering speech, repeating many of his false and divisive claims that the 2020 election was being stolen from him.

He brushed off his party’s surprisingly poor performance in last week’s midterm contest, in which the GOP failed to challenge a thin majority of Senate Democrats and was on track to narrowly win the House amid predictions of a “red wave.” take over.

“Nancy Pelosi was fired,” Trump said. “I said, ‘If you win by two seats, be happy.'”