What Jenna Bush Hager Was "Never Allowed" to Do at the White House as a Kid
"We never did it again," the TODAY co-anchor recalled after her grandmother quickly enforced a strict rule.
When Jenna Bush Hager was a young girl in elementary school, her beloved "Gampy," George H.W. Bush, moved into the White House. And as first granddaughters of the 41st President of the United States, the TODAY co-anchor and her twin sister, Barbara Pierce Bush, had some fun exploring all of the new amenities, including when they tried to order a PB&J to the White House bowling alley. Key word: "tried."
Their "Ganny" Barbara Bush promptly shut that mission down before the sandwich could even arrive. Years later, Bush Hager recalled how the moment taught them valuable life lessons.
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Jenna Bush Hager's grandmother Barbara Bush had rules for the White House kitchen
During a 2020 appearance on Watch What Happens Live with Andy Cohen, Bush Hager revealed how she and her twin sister got in trouble as kids after trying to order a snack from the White House kitchen.
“We were never allowed to do that," Bush Hager told Andy Cohen, who asked her what she liked to order from the White House chef. “My sister and I tried to order a peanut butter and jelly when my grandpa was president. And my grandmother came down to the bowling alley and was like, ‘This is not a hotel, you are not allowed to order, we eat meals at this time.’ And we never did it again.”
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The story is one Bush Hager remembers fondly. Following her death at 92 years old in 2018, Bush Hager wrote a letter for TODAY to her late grandmother and shared how that White House moment taught her "humility and grace."
"I will never forget when Barbara and I as 7-year-olds snuck to the bowling alley and ordered presidential peanut butter sandwiches," her letter read. "We couldn't wait for someone to deliver what was sure to be the fanciest sandwich of our lives when you opened the door, scolding us, telling us under no circumstances could we order food in the White House again, this was not a hotel. You taught us humility and grace."
Through the years, Barbara Bush was lovingly and famously called "The Enforcer" by her family, as Bush Hager shared in her letter. "We called you 'The Enforcer.' It was because, of course, you were a force and you wrote the rules and your rules were simple. Treat everyone equally, don't look down on anyone, use your voices for good, read all the great books," she wrote.
Jenna Bush Hager thought "all grandpas got inaugurated" when she was a kid
When she was around 7 years old, Bush Hager attended her grandfather's inauguration in 1989, which she and her sister thought was something that all grandfathers got to celebrate at some point.
“When you’re in first grade, you don’t quite realize the gravity,” Bush Hager told her former TODAY co-host Hoda Kotb in 2020. “Like Barbara and I were just so excited to be with our cousins and to get to go to this magical place — the Capitol. We kind of thought all grandpas got inaugurated. Just because our grandfather was particularly humble, he didn’t act more important than anybody else, and so it was such a fun memory.”
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In a 2021 interview with Maria Shriver's The Sunday Paper, Bush Hager shared that her "earliest memory is being at my grandfather's inauguration."
"We didn’t quite understand the significance of it. We just saw somebody that we loved being sworn into office," she said. "We loved balloons and the parade. And we’re from Texas so even just to be in Washington when it was cold and beautiful and wintery — it was almost like living a dream."
