Prime time has gotten ugly for MSNBC. The struggling news network has lost more than half of its audience since Election Night

When Elon Musk and Donald Trump Jr. mused this week about Musk buying MSNBC, they made reference to the network's poor ratings as of late. A week after the US election, the New York Times reported that MSNBC had seen a 39% decline in viewers from October.

MSNBC’s audience has tanked since the election. The liberal network’s viewership is down by 47 percent overall since Nov. 5 and by 52 percent during primetime, the latest Nielsen ratings show. Morning Joe’s numbers had already fallen by 38 percent after hosts Joe Scarborough and Mika Brzezinski flew to Mar-a-Lago to extend an olive branch to president-elect Donald Trump.