Anderson Cooper
Anchor, Anderson Cooper 360°
Miami Connection
Anderson Cooper gained significant national attention for his passionate on-the-ground reporting during Hurricane Katrina in 2005, which included coverage of the storm's devastating impact on the U.S. Gulf Coast, with ties to South Florida's regional awareness of hurricane vulnerabilities. While primarily New York-based, his CNN platform has frequently covered Miami and South Florida stories, from hurricanes and politics to cultural events, influencing local discourse. His journalism on disaster response resonates in Miami, a hurricane-prone city, highlighting preparedness and recovery efforts.
About
Born June 3, 1967, in New York City to writer Wyatt Emory Cooper and heiress Gloria Vanderbilt, Anderson Cooper grew up in a prominent family marked by glamour and tragedy. After graduating from Yale University with a B.A. in political science in 1989, he started as a fact-checker for Channel One News, forging his own path by self-producing coverage from war-torn areas in Myanmar and Africa, which led to his role as chief international correspondent. He joined ABC News in 1995 as a correspondent and co-anchored World News Now, briefly hosting the reality show The Mole in 2000 before returning to news post-9/11. At CNN since 2001, he launched Anderson Cooper 360° in 2003, hosted New Year's Eve specials from Times Square, and contributed to 60 Minutes for two decades until announcing his departure in 2026. His reporting on Hurricane Katrina in 2005 propelled him to national prominence, and he has covered events like the Iraq and Afghanistan wars, the Haiti earthquake, and the COVID-19 pandemic. Cooper has also authored bestsellers like Dispatches from the Edge and hosted documentaries such as Planet in Peril.