Michael Cohen, executive vice president of the Trump Organization and special counsel to Donald J. Trump, said Thursday that Mr. Trump actually accounted for a big portion of the approximately 15 million people who tuned into Tuesday’s Democratic presidential debate.
Mr. Cohen said Mr. Trump, the billionaire businessman and 2016 GOP presidential front-runner, picked up “147,000-plus” new Twitter followers during the debate.
“That’s just an unheard-of number,” he said on CNN’s “New Day.” “Hillary picked up 25,000. So I think what it means to me is that the interest in Donald Trump versus anybody else is six times that, right?”
“I think a big portion of that 15 million viewership, which is about half of what the Republicans got, is really due to Mr. Trump,” Mr. Cohen said.
Mr. Trump announced beforehand that he would be live-tweeting the debate.
“You believe people were watching the Democratic debate because Donald Trump was tweeting about it?” asked host Chris Cuomo.
“I do,” Mr. Cohen said.
About 24 million people tuned into the first GOP debate in August on Fox News, and about 23 million people watched the second Republican debate in September on CNN.
• David Sherfinski can be reached at dsherfinski@washingtontimes.com.
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