Broadcasters Break Into Programming For Obama Announcement
President-elect Obama's announcement of his new national security team covered by ABC, CBS and NBC with follow-up on-air commentary by noted anchors.
By John Eggerton -- Broadcasting & Cable, 12/1/2008 7:00:00 AM
The Broadcast networks broke into regular programming Monday, joining the cable news nets as they covered President-elect Barack Obama's announcement of his new national security team.
That included the naming of his former rival Sen. Hillary Clinton, as secretary of state.
While there were a number of personnel announcements, including the retention of Robert Gates as defense secretary, not surprisingly most of the questions were about Clinton and the selection process. Obama said that the process was pretty straightforward, and not as "juicy" as the journalists might be looking for.
The broadcast networks remained on the air with commentary on the pick, with Andrea Mitchell anchoring NBC coverage, Diane Sawyer anchoring for ABC and Katie Couric for CBS. Most cut back to regular programming at about 11:30 after the 10:45 announcement.
