Jenna Bush Hager called out Al Roker on live television for an impromptu nickname she found unacceptable.
The “Today with Jenna & Sheinelle” host, 43, revealed the exchange during Thursday’s broadcast of her fourth-hour show, describing how Roker greeted her on Tuesday’s “Today” set with “Hey, Big Red!” while she was wearing red. Sheinelle Jones, 46, immediately backed up the story, mimicking the horrified reactions of their female colleagues.
“And all the girls were like, ‘No, no! Don’t say that!'” Jones said on the broadcast.
Bush Hager drew a hard line on the wording itself. “You can’t call somebody, a woman ‘big!'” she insisted.
Jones recalled Savannah Guthrie’s stunned response in the moment: “Oh my God, I can’t believe you said that.” Roker, apparently confused by the reaction, turned to Jones and asked, “What did I do?” Jones told him directly: “You can’t say anything that takes up space!”
Roker attempted to walk back the comment with alternative nicknames. He offered “Tall Red” among other variations to diffuse the tension. Bush Hager rejected every substitute. “I’m like, ‘Not okay!'” she exclaimed on Thursday’s show.
Jones suggested her own revision that might have passed muster: “Skinny Red!” instead.
The on-air banter carried extra weight given Bush Hager’s documented history with body image struggles. The former first daughter and mother of three — Mila, 13, Poppy, 11, and Hal, 7, with husband Henry Hager — has spoken openly about wrestling with those feelings since childhood.
“I no longer think that way and I haven’t for quite some time,” she said in a 2023 interview, describing how pregnancy and motherhood shifted her perspective. “I think having children, and your body changing in that way, is such a good reset where you realize, ‘Wow, I’ve been doing this incredible thing, and my body is so much more than a vessel to be made fun of, to be worrying about.'”
She shared a particularly poignant discovery from her past that underscored how early those pressures took hold. “I found a journal over Christmas break where in fourth grade my New Year’s resolution was to lose 5 lbs. — my daughter, my eldest is now in fourth grade and she seems so young,” she said in the same 2023 remarks.
The Tuesday incident on the main “Today” set and Thursday’s retelling on “Today with Jenna & Sheinelle” highlighted ongoing tensions around casual commentary on women’s bodies in workplace settings, even among longtime colleagues. Roker, who has co-hosted alongside Bush Hager for years, appeared to treat the moment as playful while the women around him registered immediate alarm.
Bush Hager’s willingness to revisit the exchange publicly two days later suggested the nickname landed differently than Roker intended, transforming a fleeting morning-show moment into a broader conversation about language and perception.
The “Today” show airs weekday mornings on NBC.