After dropping the bombshell news that she will be leaving Today, Hoda Kotb apparently had another shocking confession to make to Jenna Bush Hager: She once stole a wash cloth from a hotel.
The Today hosts had been discussing a viral TikTok of two best friends disagreeing over whether the robe provided in hotel rooms is “free for the taking.” Kotb noted this was a “very, very touchy subject” that has their staff “riled up.”
Bush Hager asked her co-host if she’s ever taken anything from a hotel room, to which Kotb admitted she’s taken soaps or toothpaste. “Oh, I have take a wash cloth,” she added, much to Bush Hager’s shock.
“What?!” Bush Hager responded, clearly scandalized by her confession. She then proceeded to set the scene for the audience and demonstrated Kotb unpacking her things at a hotel. “[Kotb] opened her luggage, she took out her clothes, she spread them nicely here, and then it fell in.” She added that she finds it “so weird” that Kotb prefers to unpack her luggage at hotels, and asked the Today camera crew, “Did y’all ever expect Hoda to want to organize her belongings?”
“Always!” Kotb responded, before attempting to steer the conversation back to the robe debate. “But back to the robe, we think it’s a no.”
But Bush Hager wasn’t having it. “No, sorry, back to when you stole a wash cloth,” she responded. “This is like the time you said you made out in a furniture store.”
Kotb laughed as Bush Hager continued, “What hotel was it? Just kidding.”
“You’re so bad,” Kotb told her co-host. She agreed that you cannot take robes from a hotel room, but wash cloths are up for grabs “if you need it.”
The Today hosts were in surprisingly good spirits during Friday’s (Sept. 27) broadcast considering they shared an incredibly emotional moment together on Thursday after Kotb announced she will be leaving Today in 2025.
Through tears, Kotb told Bush Hager, “It’s your turn. And whoever sits in this seat is gonna have the easiest job in the world because they’re sitting next to you! … You are the bright light, you always have been.”
She confessed that the decision to leave “weighed a lot” on her after her 60th birthday, especially because it meant saying goodbye to the “amazing” thing she built with Bush Hager.
“Saying goodbye to something that’s not working, something that’s tired, something you don’t want, that’s easy,” she told Bush Hager through tears. “But saying goodbye to something that’s amazing is hard.”
Kotb is expected to stay on The Today Show and Today With Hoda & Jenna through the beginning of 2025, though her statement notes she will “remain part of the NBC family” after her retirement.
Today with Hoda & Jenna airs on weekdays at 10/9c on NBC.