Michael Rowland

Michael Rowland (born 8 July 1968) is an Australian television news presenter and journalist, currently working for the Australian Broadcasting Corporation, having previously been an American affairs correspondent in Washington.

Additionally, he has been a financial, economic and political reporter for several Australian News channels.

Rowland has edited and written several articles and books, such as Black Summer (2021) and "ABC news channel in 2020".

He is currently co-host of the ABC's morning program News Breakfast alongside Lisa Millar, and is the network's senior presenter.

His frequent collaborations include presenters from News Breakfast, including Millar, sports presenter Tony Armstrong, finance presenter Madeleine Morris, and weather presenter Nate Byrne.

Rowland has also worked alongside other Australian news presenters such as Virginia Troili and Barrie Cassidy.

Michael Rowland was born in Victoria, Australia before moving to Sydney, New South Wales.

During his teenage years, he attended De La Salle College Ashfield and graduated in year 12.

He studied communication at the University of Technology Sydney, but quit after 1 year.

Growing up around rugby league and rugby union in Sydney's inner-west gave birth to his love of sports; he is a supporter of the AFL team the Western Bulldogs.

In his earlier years he was hit in his eye by a stray pellet from a slingshot, causing it to dilate uncontrollably.

This injury is resulted in being lifelong causing him to be anxious and nervous surrounding its visibility in his earlier parts of life.

Rowland has also expressed that he does suffer some colour blindness but this does not stem from his childhood accident.

In 1988, he transferred to a position as an NSW state political reporter directly from the cadet role in ABC's Parliament House bureau in Canberra.

Michael Rowland began his career in the news industry by reporting and journalism in the 1990s where he spent five years in the ABC's Parliament House bureau in Canberra, filing for Radio News and Lateline.

During this time he learnt about news reporting and journalism as a news cadet for over a year.

Michael Rowland worked in the Canberra Press gallery for five years covering both New South Wales and Victorian politic for the Australian Broadcasting Corporation.

He then progressed to a finance reporter in 1991 for the Australian Broadcasting Corporation.

From 1993 to 1998, Rowland joined ABC Radio News, where he still visits occasionally to present and co-host, reporting on Australian affairs including economic and political news.

During Rowland's duration working at the ABC radio station, his position included co-hosting on the financial news and providing a segment during the current affairs news segment reporting on financial and economic changes and its state within Australia and Wall street in America.

He met his future News Breakfast co-host Lisa Millar while covering the 1996 federal election at ABC's Canberra Bureau.

From 1998 to 2001, Rowland was the Victorian State political reporter for ABC News, reporting mainly major live events that were occurring and usually the political party movement in victoria.

From 2001 to 2004, Rowland was a business and finance reporter for AM, an informative morning current affairs program, The World Today, a current affairs program, PM, the midday report run by the ABC, Inside Business, the economic and financial focused branch of ABC and the 7 pm TV news broadcast across Australia.

Tow which he would have his own segment or interview with Australian politicians regarding financial initiatives and what their effect would have on the Australian trade and economy.

From late 2004 to 2005, Rowland worked with Lateline on a questionnaire and reporting shows for the ABC as an economics and business correspondent.

During his time there, he edited several articles and appeared several times on the show to provide insight into the finical situation within Australia.

Rowland was the ABC's correspondent in Washington from 2005 to 2009.

During this time, he reported the US presidential election and was ABC's Wall Street correspondent during the height of the global financial crisis.

Rowland was previously North America correspondent, and during his posting covered stories including the election of Barack Obama as US president, the outbreak of the financial crisis of 2007–2008, the Virginia Tech massacre and David Hicks' release from Guantanamo Bay detention camp.

Before going to the United States as the Australian Broadcasting corporation's American correspondent, he was Lateline finances correspondent, and also covered business and economics for a range of other ABC TV and radio outlets including AM, current affairs morning program, The World Today, a current affairs program, PM, the midday report run by the ABC, Inside Business, the economic and financial focused branch of ABC and the 7 pm TV news all of which included Rowland as the financial presenter focussing on Australian economics.

He also presented a major event in the US in 2008 following the Obama administration and affairs in the USA politics.

In June 2010, Rowland was appointed co-host of News Breakfast, replacing Joe O'Brien and has continued working on the ABC's morning breakfast segment till the current day.

In June 2019, ABC announced that Rowland would take on an expanded role as senior network presenter for ABC's morning news breakfast segment.

In addition to News Breakfast, Rowland would anchor coverage of major domestic and international events across ABC News programs, including the 7 pm News, the breakfast segment for ABC's news, and ABC radio.

In November 2020, Rowland covered the 2020 United States presidential election presenting live result of the ABC news segment as a temporary American correspondent.

In January 2021 HarperCollins published Black Summer: Stories of loss, courage and community from the 2019–2020 bushfires, was edited by Michael Rowland, with proceeds being contributed to the Red Cross Disaster Relief and Recovery Fund, as a means to provide support to the families who lost loved ones and homes during the 2020 bushfires within Australia.

Rowland reappear in this role for the United States presidential election 2020 covering it live during the coronavirus outbreak.

Rowland covering the election in 2020 in Washington DC as a means to provide insight for Australian viewers of the ABC breakfast show on US politics at the time.

During which time he reported both online answering viewers question whilst presenting on the street live whilst the final results from the Us election were occurring.

During this time, Rowland was also reporting the surges of COVID-19 outbreaks and the ways it was changing the potential outcome of election results.