“Today” co-host Jenna Bush Hager opened the July 15 episode of “Jenna & Sheinelle” with an unusual correction: she had misidentified the Austin restaurant where she was arrested nearly 25 years ago. The mistake came to light after she posted a mock Netflix documentary teaser on social media a day earlier, and fans immediately called her out.
In the viral clip posted a day earlier, Bush Hager joined a trending format in which participants pretend to be interviewed for a somber documentary while dramatic music plays. She wrote, “Preparing for my Netflix documentary about that one time at El Arroyo when I was 19. IYKYK.” But viewers who knew the details of her past arrests quickly pointed out that the incident happened at Chuy’s, not El Arroyo—both Mexican restaurants in Austin.
Bush Hager acknowledged she needed to set the record straight. She told viewers she is sorry to El Arroyo, which always served her—though she quickly added she was kidding.
The Arrests in Question
Bush Hager has two documented arrests from 2001, when she was 19 years old. The first involved a misdemeanor charge for underage alcohol possession at an Austin bar. Weeks later, she and her twin sister Barbara were arrested at a Mexican restaurant after trying to purchase alcohol with fraudulent identification. Chuy’s, not El Arroyo, was where the second incident took place.
A String of Recent Apologies
The restaurant correction is one of several on-air apologies Bush Hager has issued recently. During the July 24, 2025, episode of “Today With Jenna and Friends,” she repeated a profanity while telling Willie Geist about meeting his wife Christina. Geist told her she could say it “zero times.” Bush Hager apologized profusely and said she worried about hearing from her supervisor.
Broadcasting profanity carries serious consequences. The FCC can fine stations, revoke licenses, or issue warnings for airing obscene, indecent, or profane content.
On December 11, 2024, Bush Hager apologized to “Today” co-host Hoda Kotb during a discussion about micro weddings after mentioning Kotb’s “first wedding,” not realizing Kotb had only been married once. Kotb married Burzis Kanga, a university tennis coach, in 2005, and the pair split in 2008. Kotb was later engaged to financier Joel Schiffman for just over two years before they parted ways in January 2022. Kotb left “Today” in January 2025.
Grandmother’s Scolding Letter
Bush Hager isn’t the first in her family to face reprimands. During the June 25, 2026, episode of “Today With Jenna & Sheinelle,” she recounted an anecdote involving her grandparents, the late President George H.W. Bush and Barbara Bush, who watched her tennis match. By her own account, she was a mother of multiple children at the time, yet she was heckling the competition, doing the worm and shouting, “Not today!”
Her father, former President George W. Bush, egged her on. Her grandmother did not. Barbara Bush later mailed a letter scolding the display as unbecoming and admonishing George W. Bush for cheering it on. The former first lady signed off with an instruction to destroy the letter and tell no one about it—a request Bush Hager has now recounted on national television more than once.
Whether the subject is a decades-old arrest, an errant curse word or a grandmother’s stern note, Bush Hager has built a rapport with viewers on her willingness to own the misstep and laugh at it. The El Arroyo apology, complete with a wink toward a documentary that does not exist, fit the pattern precisely—a public correction that doubled as a joke, and a reminder that the “Today” host is rarely the last to know when she has gotten something wrong.
