By Mark Gray
4:30am PST, Feb 2, 2023
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Jenna Bush Hager has come a long way since her days residing in the White House as a teen. As a host on the "Today" show, the former first daughter has delighted fans with hilarious and very unexpected stories about her marriage, her failures, her famous family, her life at 1600 Pennsylvania Ave. and, of course, her affinity for going commando.
Click through to take a look back at some of Jenna Bush Hager's funniest and most shocking on-air admissions…
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On a November 2022 episode of "Today with Hoda and Jenna," Hoda Kotb stunningly revealed that Jenna Bush Hager "never wears underwear." After Hoda blurted out the secret live on the air, Jenna confirmed her affinity for going commando, saying, "It makes a more pretty silhouette!" While still stunned at her co-host for letting the world in on her underwear preferences, Jenna said, "I also think you don't have to pack as much. There's a lot of pros to it!" While joking to Hoda, she added, "You promised me you wouldn't do this! There's a lot of people here! I'm sure my mom has never been more proud."
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Times change, but Jenna Bush Hager doesn't. On the Feb. 1, 2023, episode of "Today ," Jenna told viewers about an upcoming three-day trip to Quebec City, Canada. Hoda Kotb asked her the inevitable question: "How many pairs of underwear do you pack?" Not flinching, Jenna replied, "zero." Say what you want about Jenna, but he's a luggage space saver!
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Jenna Bush Hager dined with King Charles III the evening before his mother, Queen Elizabeth II, passed away. At the time, Jenna was in Scotland to interview Queen Consort Camilla. The interview never happened, though: "I was supposed to meet with the now-Queen Consort around 1:30 p.m. At 12:30 p.m., we heard sort of running up and down the halls. [Camilla's representatives] came in and said, 'Can you please be quiet. There's a call,'" Jenna recalled while explaining why Camilla canceled the interview. She later revealed on "Watch What Happens Live" that all the male guests wore kilts during the dinner in Scotland. The "Today" host, however, chose "a beautiful, tight dress" for the occasion, which prompted her to go without underwear. "It would have shown!" she said of her decision to go sans underpants while dining with royalty.
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Well, this had to have been awkward! Back in 2009, Jenna Bush Hager took her grandpa, former President George H.W. Bush, to the movies to see, of all things, "Bruno" — a film rife with nudity and sexually explicit jokes. "The worst part is, like, right away he was like, 'Do we leave? Do we have to leave?'" she later said, adding that Secret Service agents had their hands covering their faces for much of the flick. Of all the movies in theaters that day, why did they choose that one? "I recommended it!" Hager told "Today" co-host Willie Giest. "Because I didn't know! I didn't know!" Jenna, the former POTUS and the Secret Service agents stayed for the entirety of the movie, but they all felt embarrassed as they left the theater.
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Jenna Bush Hager began dating now-husband Henry Hager when her dad was still the president and while she was living with her family at the White House. Years later, she opened up about the time Henry got caught sneaking out of the White House in the wee hours of the morning. "My parents were traveling and I was staying there," she said on the "Today" show. "We'd gone out to the bars and, like all relationships do, it reached a certain level. Henry said he woke up and he looked around and he was, like, 'Aaaaaaaah' because he worked for my dad." Jenna recalled thinking, "'Well, have fun.' I didn't care. Bye." Henry, she added, was "walking as fast as he could." In November 2022, Jenna told Andy Cohen on "Watch What Happens Live" that Secret Service agents "caught" Henry during his walk of shame. "They're supposed to keep people from coming in. They're not looking for people that are going out — especially a 26 year old in the night-before clothes," she said. "Their job wasn't to make sure I wasn't hooking up."
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A stranger once helped Jenna Bush Hager out of her pants. Yep, you read that right. It all happened because of a wardrobe malfunction that occurred while she was traveling with her sister, Barbara. "I wore this outfit. I thought I looked so cute. We go into the bathroom and what happened [was the middle part of my zipper popped]. I kind of knew it popped but I just ignored it because the shirt [I was wearing at the time] was long enough [to cover it]," she said on the "Today" show in May 2022. "I'm going to the bathroom and I go 'Barbara, I can't get out of my pants.' We drove for four hours. I was dying." While in the restroom, a random woman overheard Jenna's plight. "Honey, you can't get out of your pants? Hold on one minute, I got pliers in my car,'" Jenna recalled the woman saying. She shared a video of the incident with "Today" — which the show later posted on Instagram. "She came back in with pliers. That woman in that video is a stranger who was cutting me out of my pants. … 'Oh, I've had these pliers since I jumped out of planes in the army,' that's what she said," Jenna recalled. "She fixed it right away. I was laughing hysterically."
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Jenna Bush Hager nearly gave the world a free show while dancing with her father, George W. Bush, at the 2001 Inaugural Ball. A photo from the moment shows Jenna touching her chest with a hand on the strap of her dress. "My dress fell off," she told Andy Cohen on "Watch What Happens Live" in November 2022. Back in 2017, she told Hoda Kotb on the "Today" show, "My dad spun me, and my dress nearly fell down. In that moment, I'm thinking, 'Ohhhhhh, no.'''
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While we know Jenna Bush Hager by her legal name, the Secret Service knew her by another name: Twinkle. Sounds nice, right? But there was sometimes confusion about her code name, and it was unflattering. "When you have Secret Service, you have a code name, and my sister's code name was 'Turquoise' because her eyes are really beautiful and turquoise," Jenna once said on the "Today" show. "[Mine was] 'Twinkle,' which some people got confused with 'tinkle.' Would you rather turquoise or twinkle?" …Anyone gotta use the restroom?
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Within a five-week period back in 2001 while Jenna Bush Hager was studying at the University of Texas, she was cited for both possession of alcohol and using a fake ID to purchase alcohol. To this day, she's embarrassed about her rap sheet, though her father, who was POTUS at the time, never let her feel bad about what went down. "When I called my dad to say, 'I'm really sorry,' … he said, 'No, I'm sorry.' We did embarrass [our parents], but they never would say that," Jenna later recalled. "He said, 'I'm sorry, I told you [that] you can be normal, and you can't. You can't order margaritas.'" Acknowledging her high-profile failure, she added, "We embarrassed [my parents] — although they never said it — on the world stage."
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Awkward! The great thing about Jenna Bush Hager is that she rolls with the punches and can make fun of herself even when things are cringe-worthy! On just her second day hosting the "Today" show, Jenna showed viewers a bracelet that Kathie Lee Gifford left in her dressing room. The bracelet was engraved with: "My joy is non-negotiable." Jenna was so moved by the purported gift that she showed off the jewelry to viewers. "Kathie has been so gracious, and this is just another example of that," Jenna said. It turns out, however, that the bracelet wasn't for her at all. The bracelet was actually for Hoda to commemorate the birth of her first child, daughter Haley Joy. Haley's name was even engraved on the back of the bracelet, but Jenna hadn't bothered to turn the jewelry all the way around to see it. "I read the first thing thinking it was repeated twice," Jenna sheepishly said. Nope! It literally said on the back, "Hailey Joy 2017." Laughing uncontrollably, Hoda said, "It was meant for me. I love it. Thank you."
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Nothing says romance like the combination of a car accident and the Secret Service. While speaking to Hoda Kotb about her love life, Jenna Bush Hager couldn't help but remember a less-than-passionate date with now-husband Henry Hager. "My worst first date involved the Secret Service, let's just leave it at that," she said. "It was with Henry and his car ran out of gas and went backwards and hit the Secret Service." At the time, Jenna and Henry were driving around Arlington, Virginia. "He started to go up the hill and then boop, crash," Jenna recalled while laughing. "I was laughing but he was horrified." Fortunately, no one was injured in the crash.
