Jenna Bush Hager isn’t fazed by a little harmless flirting — in fact, she thinks it adds a little spark to her marriage with husband Henry Chase Hager.
In a candid chat with her Today show cohost Hoda Kotb, Bush Hager revealed, “Sometimes I like it when people flirt with Henry.”
When asked why, the former first daughter, 42, explained it’s a confidence booster, saying, “I’m just like, ‘Baby girl’s still got it!’” She added: “Because I am very secure in our relationship.”
While Bush Hager says she appreciates a bit of attention towards her husband, she draws a line too.
“If it’s a very small amount [of flirting,] I find it attractive,” she said, but emphasized that Hager “wouldn’t do it a lot.”
The couple’s love story started during her father George W. Bush‘s presidency, with some amusing moments along the way.
Early on in their relationship, Bush Hager sneaked her now-husband in for a secret overnight stay at the White House, only to be caught by a Secret Service agent.
Bush Hager shared the moment candidly on both Watch What Happens Live with Andy Cohen and Today with Hoda & Jenna, telling her cohost: “Henry said he woke up and he looked around and he was like, ‘Aaaaaaaah’ because he worked for my dad.”
Despite the surprise encounter, her response was nonchalant: “‘Well have fun,’ I didn’t care. Bye!” she recalled.
“My parents were traveling and I was staying there,” Bush Hager added. “We’d gone out to the bars and, like all relationships do, it reached a certain level.”
“Can you imagine waking up and just being, like, ‘Where am I? What is this strange room?’” she added.
Bush Hager later told Cohen, however, that the problem was that Hager “got caught” by the Secret Service.
In a podcast episode with Kate Bowler last year, Bush Hager said she admired her husband for his ability to roll with the punches.
“The point is, he stuck around after that, and so much more,” she said. “I gravitate towards people — and I think everyone does — who get in the game.”
Now happily married for 15 years, the pair share three children, Mila, 10, Poppy, 8, and Hal, 4. Hager made it clear that their family is complete — despite Bush Hager wanting baby No. 4.
“It’s sort of time for me to have another baby,” Jenna, 41, said on an August 2023 episode of Today With Hoda & Jenna. “I’d like to have another … We’re not.”
“Henry put his foot down. He says we have three healthy babies,” she added, noting that age and previous “health stuff” were the reasons the couple would not move forward with another pregnancy.
While Bush Hager didn’t specify which health struggles she was referring to, she has been candid in the past about the ectopic pregnancy she experienced before giving birth to daughter Mila in 2013.
She shared that while losing the baby was difficult at the time, she is grateful for her three healthy, happy children.
“When I look at those three kids’ faces — had that baby lived — the other three wouldn’t necessarily be mine and I always think about those little twists that felt like the hardest heartaches,” she said.
