New Year’s Eve: CNN Viewers Celebrated Anderson Cooper’s Reaction to His First Shot of the Night

It may be 2020, but Anderson Cooper‘s love of tequila, or lack thereof, hasn’t grown much. During Tuesday night’s New Year’s Eve special, the CNN anchor and his co-host Andy Cohen continued their trend of ringing in a new year with a few shots, much to the delight of viewers who couldn’t help but comment on Cooper’s reactions.

The duo, who have been co-hosting the network’s New Year’s Eve programming for three years, brought alcohol into the mix at around 8 p.m., with Cooper appearing to struggle after downing the shot.

“I’m just trying to breathe,” a visibly shaken Cooper told Cohen, igniting the internet with humorous responses.

“Anderson Cooper completely losing his composure and enduring his shots just as well as last NYE is energy I needed to crawl into this next decade,” one viewer tweeted.

“Watching the [CNNNYE] replay, just for the sole purpose of watching [Anderson Cooper’s] reaction after every shot he takes!” another joked.

“LOL, Anderson Cooper is so adorable. The faces he makes when he drinks a shot of alcohol, is hilarious,” a third viewer reacted.

That shot was just one of many of the night, and Cooper later sent viewers into a fit of laughter thanks to his reaction after taking a shot while speaking with rapper 50 Cent, who was ringing in 2020 from Miami, Florida.

“I didn’t want to explode in front of 50 Cent,” Cooper, who held his face after downing the shot, said. “I was trying to seem cool in front of him.”

Cooper has hosted CNN’s New Year’s Eve programming for more than a decade and was first joined by Kathy Griffin before her firing in 2017. He was then joined by Cooper, and their booze-filled antics have been going viral ever since.

Before taking the stage and bringing out the alcohol, however, the co-hosts had a much calmer moment. On Instagram, Cohen just hours earlier shared a video of his 10-month-old son Benjamin Allen and Cooper bonding. In the clip, Ben could be seen playing with Cohen’s badge for accessing CNN’s New Year’s Eve Live set.