THE Sun’s political editor is leaving the post for a new job covering Donald Trump in America.
Harry Cole, who has led the right-wing tabloid’s political coverage for five years, will become the paper’s editor-at-large based in Fox News’s Washington DC bureau.
Reporting to the paper’s editor-in-chief Victoria Newton, Cole will write a Saturday column for The Sun and host an online chat show produced by Red Seat Ventures.
He will also write a monthly column for The Sun’s American sibling, the New York Post, and will appear on Fox News, another arm of Rupert Murdoch’s media empire.
Cole said: “After covering six PMs, a pandemic, wars and all the political skullduggery of Westminster, it's a wrench to leave the lobby after 10 years.
“It's been an honour to serve the last five in the most fun job in political journalism – but I can't wait to get stuck into the biggest story on the planet right now for our readers, viewers and listeners.”
The Sun is part of the British arm of Murdoch’s media empire, of which his most conservative son Lachlan (above) is seen as the heir apparent amid an ongoing legal push from his siblings to wrest control of News Corp and the Fox Corporation.
Murdoch stepped down as chair of the two companies in 2023, but is still believed to have sway over them.
While The Sun was perceived as hugely influential in its heyday, the paper’s significance has waned with the decline in circulation numbers across print media.
The paper’s link with deciding the outcomes of UK elections since 1979 was broken in 2010 after it backed David Cameron’s Conservatives, who lost out on an overall majority and had to form a coalition with the LibDems.
However, the paper has backed the winners of every General Election since, including swinging behind Labour last year, as well as coming out for the winning sides of the Brexit and Scottish independence referendums.
Cole is one of a number of UK journalists who have moved across the pond to cover the new Trump administration, including Katy Balls, who quit The Spectator for The Sunday Times, and Jack Blanchard at Politico.
Names tipped to replace him in one of the top jobs in lobby journalism include his deputy Ryan Sabey, The Sun on Sunday's political editor Kate Ferguson, and The Sun's chief political correspondent Jack Elsom.
