The president’s press secretary, Sean Spicer, denounced the report as “despicable
and reprehensible.” Mr. Trump, in an interview with Fox’s Mr. Carlson on Wednesday, dismissed the journalist who obtained the tax forms, David Cay Johnston, as “not much.”
MSNBC’s audience on Tuesday peaked between 9:15 and 9:30 p.m., around the time Ms. Maddow was informing viewers of Mr. Trump’s tax payment.
Reveal of Trump Tax Records Brings Rachel Maddow Record Viewership -
By MICHAEL M. GRYNBAUMMARCH 16, 2017
Rachel Maddow’s slow-walk reveal of President Trump’s decade-old tax records on Tuesday night did not earn her much journalistic praise.
Viewership figures in the television industry have been delayed this week
because of an electrical problem at a Nielsen company facility near Tampa, Fla.
A version of this article appears in print on March 17, 2017, on Page B5 of the New
York edition with the headline: Tax-Return Tease Gives Maddow Record Ratings.