MSNBC's Rachel Maddow rode big numbers from her highly scrutinized story on March 14 about President Trump's tax returns to finish at the top of the cable news race for a second straight week in the key 25- to 54-year-old demographic.

For the week of March 13 to 17, "The Rachel Maddow Show" averaged 756,000 in the demographic that advertisers covet most.

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After receiving criticism from the left and right for what many observers felt was over-hyping the story via a tweet stating she was in possession of "Trump's tax returns," Maddow's Tuesday audience in the key demographic dropped precipitously the following night on Wednesday, down 54 percent from the prior evening to 661,000 viewers.

Tuesday's episode that eventually revealed two pages from Trump's 2005 tax returns registered 4.1 total million viewers and 1.4 million the key demographic, according to Nielsen data. BREAKING: We've got Trump tax returns. Tonight, 9pm ET. MSNBC.



(Seriously). — Rachel Maddow MSNBC (@maddow) March 14, 2017 Fox's "The O’Reilly Factor" finished second on the week in the key demographic with 691,000 viewers over four nights. Fox ran a special edition of "The Five" at 8 p.m with Bill O'Reilly off.

Fox News still led all of basic cable in total viewers for the 11th straight week, with MSNBC, HGTV, USA Network and Discovery rounding out the top five.

Nielsen data also shows a big jump for MSNBC year-over-year, up more than 72 percent in total viewers versus the same month last year.

Rival CNN is down more than 45 percent in this category, while Fox is down almost 12 percent.