Don Lemon Was Seemingly Drunk on CNN’s New Year’s Eve Broadcast, and Viewers Couldn’t Get Enough

In what’s fast-becoming a beloved New Year’s Eve tradition, CNN anchor Don Lemon appeared to be letting loose quite a bit during the network’s broadcast last night. While in Nashville to help ring in 2020, Lemon was singing and dancing the night away while still holding his own with co-anchor Brook Baldwin, and even sported a “Don Lemon 2020” forearm tattoo. There’s no confirmation if this was a real or temporary tattoo made just for the occasion, but Twitter was having a blast watching Lemon’s antics nonetheless.

“Watching Don Lemon get drunk on national TV for NYE is America’s favorite pastime,” wrote one fan as another called it “a beloved tradition that justifies his entire salary.” Most of the sentiments were overwhelmingly positive, and as one user put it, “Don Lemon bringing in the New Year drunk off his ass is my favorite NYE tradition.”

Lemon himself teased the event before the broadcast on Twitter, promising that New Year’s Eve this year was going to be taken “to the next level.”

While he unleashed his tattoo on the world last night, the ‘#piercing’ hashtag is a reminder to New Year’s Eve 2016, when Lemon got his ear pierced live on the air. The following year, he and Baldwin spent the holiday at The Spotted Cat in New Orleans, where he again appeared to get a little tipsy, much to the delight of viewers everywhere.

Back in April, the CNN Tonight host had announced his engagement to longtime boyfriend Tim Malone, but the couple also have a connection to Lemon’s New Year’s Eve celebrations. They started dating back in the summer of 2016, and they then memorably rang in 2018 with an on-air kiss shared during CNN’s broadcast that year.

Lemon came out as gay in 2011 with his memoir, Transparent, where he chronicled his life, including the sexual abuse he endured as a child by his mother’s close friend. While tasked with such a personal memoir, Lemon saw it as the ideal time to share with the world who he is.

“I cannot write a book about my life and not talk about what I had been for the past 44 years – I was 44 at the time – and a big part of that is being gay,” Lemon admitted in an interview with NPR that year.