US President Joe Biden stepped down early Monday morning Australian time. The news broke just as breakfast radio shows were firing up and breakfast TV shows started the new week.
The news broke too late to make the print editions of Monday newspapers, but publications pushed out the news quickly on their socials and then remade home pages.
On Nine’s Today show, the hosts Karl and Sarah were anchoring the program from Paris ahead of the start of Paris 2024 this Friday.
Seven’s Sunrise had reporters crossing live to hosts Natalie and Matt back in Sydney – David Woiwod was outside the White House with Mylee Hogan in Delaware covering Joe Biden.
ABC Breakfast had co-host Michael Rowland outside the White House where he interviewed passers-by for reactions. Among the guests ABC breakfast put to air was former Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull.
As 9am passed this morning both Sky News and ABC News continued rolling coverage of the Biden retirement.
Also outside the White House was Trudy McIntosh for Sky News Australia where she reported back to breakfast host Peter Stefanovic about the changes. Annelise Nielsen was in the Sky News US studio.
Also jumping on air quickly this morning was Ahron Young at Melbourne-based global streaming news service Ticker. In addition to live rolling coverage, Ticker had several reports available on-demand too.
One of the quickest responses to the changes came from TIME magazine which quickly updated its recent Joe Biden front cover. It featured US President Joe Biden working off the political scene with just a one-word coverline – Panic. The new cover featured Vice President Kamala Harris walking onto the scene with no cover lines.
The first newspaper commentary came from The Australian just days after it celebrated its 60th birthday. Greg Sheridan wrote:
Joe Biden fought fiercely against reality and ultimately reality won.
Everyone who witnessed his shocking debate performance a couple of weeks ago saw an old man in manifest mental decline who was plainly not fit for the presidency or indeed any responsible job
That Biden ignored and denied reality for so long has done his party enormous damage. It must now pick a replacement in a panic.
Vice President Kamala Harris, whom Biden endorsed, is probably not the best candidate, but it will be bitter and difficult if she is passed over.
Seven West Media’s new online publication The Nightly quickly pushed out a detailed summary this morning under the subject line Biden drops US president re-election bid, backs Harris. The update contained five features about what happens next and detailed Donald Trump’s “brutal response”.
US cable TV shows quickly assembled panels for what will no doubt be wall-to-wall coverage for the rest of the week.