Jenna Bush Hager Confesses On ‘Today’ That She ‘Went Too Far’ With Joke About Having An Affair

Jenna Bush Hager, 41, has come under fire a few times over the years, so she must know a thing or two about what causes a stir with the viewers at home. We think this is why she immediately apologized after making a joke about having an affair on Today, despite it seemingly being very obvious that it was a light-hearted comment that was meant to be taken in jest.

The incident took place on the Monday, October 16th episode of Today With Hoda & Jenna when Jenna – who has been married to Henry Hager for 15 years and with whom she shares three children – was telling co-host Hoda Kotb, 59, about how much she loved men who read books, referring to it as an attractive quality. This makes sense seeing as she has her own Read with Jenna book club, which celebrated its fourth anniversary earlier this year.

Kotb said the sight of a man engrossed in a book is “hot,” which Bush Hager wholeheartedly agreed with. She told her co-host and the viewers at home that she becomes “dehydrated when a man takes out a book,” but things took a turn when Kotb asked her an interesting hypothetical question…

Kotb asked: “OK, you see a man with a book sitting on a park bench in Central Park reading, what is the first thing you’re thinking?” And Bush Hager joked: “If they have little eyeglasses too, just sitting reading, and if they’re reading something I respect? I mean that could be a means for an affair.”