Jenna Bush Hager Explains Why She Chose Savannah Guthrie to Be Her Son’s Godmother

Photo credit: Instagram/Savannah Guthrie
Photo credit: Instagram/Savannah Guthrie

From Country Living

  • Jenna Bush Hager revealed that her Today colleague, Savannah Guthrie, is godmother to her only son and youngest child, Henry Harold “Hal” Hager.

  • Jenna and Savannah are longtime friends and their faith has bonded them.


We always knew Jenna Bush Hager and Savannah Guthrie were close, but this week, we learned that the Today colleagues and longtime best friends are more like family. In an interview with E!’s Jason Kennedy on Instagram Live, Jenna revealed that Savannah is godmother to her only son and youngest child, 8-month-old Henry Harold “Hal” Hager. “I’ve never said this before, but Savannah is Hal’s godmother,” Jenna revealed.

According to the Today anchor, selecting Savannah for the role was an easy choice. “We go to the same church, our faith is really important to us,” she said.

Jenna, who’s also mom to 4-year-old Poppy and 7-year-old Mila, said that after her grandfather George H.W. Bush died, Savannah wrote “beautiful” prayers for her to read at his funeral. “I stood up in front of this church that we go to, and I just lost it,” Jenna recalled. “I couldn’t read. I was shaking so hard, sobbing so much that Savannah had to step in… That’s what a really beautiful friend does, they step in when you have lost your voice.”

Savannah has been there for Hal since the very beginning, too. When he was born, she visited Jenna in the hospital and held him for the first time. “Welcome to the world, dearest Hal Hager!” she captioned an Instagram photo of the moment. “I am here to love you and squeeze you and hold you tight forever!!”

Savannah and Jenna’s special bond didn’t start on the set of Today, though. “We’re almost exactly 10 years apart and 10 years ago, when she got married to Henry, I was a fourth string White House reporter and they assigned me to go cover her wedding,” Guthrie old People. “It’s hilarious, because there are live shots of me talking about Jenna getting married.”

“Isn’t it beautiful and delightful, the turns that life takes?” she added. “Here I was, just a reporter, trying to find out anything about the wedding. Ten years later, she’s one of my closest friends.”

Jenna echoed similar feelings about her Today with Hoda & Jenna co-host, Hoda Kotb, adding that both Hoda and Savannah are two of her very best friends. “You want to surround yourself with people who have good energy,” she said. “You want to surround yourself with people who have your back.”

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