Anderson Hays Cooper (born June 3, 1967) is an American television journalist. He is the primary anchor of the CNN news broadcast show Anderson Cooper 360°. In addition to his duties at CNN, Cooper serves as a correspondent for 60 Minutes on CBS News.
Born into a wealthy family in Manhattan, Cooper graduated from Yale University with a Bachelor of Arts in 1989. As a young journalist, he began traveling the world, shooting footage of war-torn regions for Channel One News. Cooper was hired by ABC News as a correspondent in 1995, but he soon took more jobs throughout the network, working for a short time as a co-anchor, reality game show host, and fill-in morning talk show host.
In 2001, Cooper joined CNN, where he was given his own show, Anderson Cooper 360°, in 2003; he has remained the show's host since. He developed a reputation for his on-the-ground reporting of breaking news events, with his coverage of Hurricane Katrina causing his popularity to sharply increase. For his coverage of the 2010 Haiti earthquake, Cooper received a National Order of Honour and Merit, the highest honor granted by the Haitian government. From September 2011 to May 2013, he also served as the host of his own syndicated daytime talk show, Anderson Live. Cooper has won 18 Emmy Awards and two Peabody Awards, as well as an Edward Murrow Award from the Overseas Press Club in 2011.
Cooper came out as gay in 2012, becoming "the most prominent openly gay journalist on American television" at the time, according to The New York Times. In 2016, Cooper became the first openly LGBT person to moderate a presidential debate, and he has received several awards from the LGBT rights organization GLAAD.
Last Updated: June 9, 2021
