Former New York City Mayor Eric Adams had choice words for Andy Cohen after the Bravo star criticized him on CNN’s New Year’s Eve Live on Wednesday, December 31.
Cohen, 57, celebrated the end of Adams’ run as NYC mayor just after midnight on Thursday, January 1, as Zohran Mamdani was being sworn in as the city’s 112th mayor.
Calling Adams’ mayoral run “chaotic,” Cohen sarcastically said, “Great, you got your pardons. Go off into the sunset. We’ll fiddle with what we have, with what you’ve left us with,” per NewsNation.
“Go dance away,” Cohen continued. “We’ll see you at all the parties. You’ve partied your way through four years.”
Not long after Anderson Cooper started hosting CNN’s New Year’s Eve coverage from Times Square in 2002, the news program often became the news. In 2007, Kathy Griffin joined as the journalist’s official cohost. While the unlikely duo brought the laughs, Griffin made waves annually for her dirty jokes and cursing. Still, the network stood […]
On Thursday, Adams, 65, hit back at Cohen via an X post, writing, “My response to @Andy: AA. Another sloppy drunken rant.”
“If anyone actually cares about him, they’ll tell him to get help,” Adams continued. “New Yorkers aren’t laughing with him. They are concerned about him. Public intoxication is a disease. He should seek help.”
“He was safe in Times Square because we did our job. Again,” Adams said, referring to Cohen hosting the annual CNN New Year’s Eve special live from New York’s Times Square.
“Seek help. AAA: Andy’s Alcohol Anonymous,” he concluded.
Andy Cohen and Anderson Cooper Courtesy of Andy Cohen/Instagram
Cohen has not publicly responded to Adams’ post. Us Weekly has reached out to his representative for comment.
In 2024, Adams, who served as NYC mayor from January 2022 to December 2025, faced a federal indictment on charges including bribery, fraud and soliciting illegal foreign campaign donations. He pleaded not guilty. The charges against him were later dropped.
Cohen, meanwhile, hosted CNN’s notoriously boozy New Year’s Eve Live special with Anderson Cooper for the ninth consecutive year.
Roy Rochlin/Getty Images Andy Cohen and Anderson Cooper are known for their hilarious — and sometimes unhinged — antics during CNN’s live New Year’s Eve broadcast. Cohen became Cooper’s cohost in 2017 when he replaced Kathy Griffin. However, the pair have known each other for decades after first crossing paths when their friends tried to […]
The pair were joined by actor B.J. Novak shortly after midnight, when Cohen commented on Adams’ tenure as mayor, prompting Novak to joke, “Andy, Andy, we’ve got to cut you off. I’ve seen this happen.”
Novak was seemingly referring to Cohen’s infamous rant about another former NYC mayor, Bill de Blasio, during CNN’s 2021-22 New Year’s Eve special. “[I’ve been] watching Mayor de Blasio do his ‘victory lap’ dance after four years of the crappiest job as the mayor of New York,” Cohen said. “The only thing that the Democrats and the Republicans can agree on is what a horrible mayor he has been, so sayonara, sucka!”
CNN defended Cohen at the time, saying in a statement, “Andy said something he shouldn’t have on live TV. We’ve addressed it with him and look forward to having him back again next year.”
For his part, Cohen said during a February 2022 appearance on Jimmy Kimmel Live! that he didn’t remember much of the rant.
“[Anderson Cooper and I] got in the car after [the CNN special] and I saw on Twitter the rant I did about de Blasio. And I did not recall — though it was about 40 minutes earlier — saying, ‘Sayonara, sucka’ to the outgoing mayor of New York,” Cohen explained.
He added, “I go,’Oh, my God, I said, ‘Sayonara, sucka.’ And [Cooper] said, ‘Yes, you did!’”
Cohen said he “had a blast” hosting the show with Cooper, 58. “It is super fun getting drunk on CNN and just raging on a soapbox. There were endorphins that I was releasing. I was like, ‘This is good!’” he said.
