Jenna Bush Hager On Hoda Kotb’s ‘Today’ Replacement: “We’re Still Searching”

Jenna Bush Hager is sharing an update on the search for Hoda Kotb‘s replacement on the fourth hour of the Today show.

Hager has been hosting Today with Jenna & Friends since Kotb’s departure, and a swinging door of co-hosts has filled the empty chair. In a new interview, Hager reveals where they’re at in finding a permanent co-host.

“We’re still searching,” Hager told People. “We definitely want somebody permanent at some point just because that’s our show, and I think the Today show is such a family.”

She continued, “So to have somebody sit in that seat means a lot to all of us. So it will happen. I think we’ve all just been kind of living day by day and we don’t have any developments yet, but we will.”

Hager reunited with her former co-host on the Today show on May 28 when Kotb joined the NBC morning show as one of Hager’s friends.

“It was so nice,” she said of the reunion. “Even if time goes by, there’s a connection that is undeniable, and I felt that way being with her. I just felt like my nervous system kind of relaxed and it was so nice to be with her. There could have been no better reunion. It felt really great.”

Kotb left the Today show in January, saying at the time she announced her departure, “I’ve been weighing this decision for quite a while – Am I truly ready? But, my sixtieth birthday celebration on the Plaza felt like a shift. Like a massive, joyful YES, you are! I saw it all so clearly: my broadcast career has been beyond meaningful, a new decade of my life lies ahead, and now my daughters and my mom need and deserve a bigger slice of my time pie.”