Hoda Kotb has shared many life milestones — both triumphant and difficult — with TV audiences for years.
The Today anchor began her tenure on the morning show in 2007 when cohosting Today With Kathie Lee & Hoda. The 10 a.m. slot quickly became a fan favorite, with viewers loving Kotb’s sunny persona and positive demeanor. A decade later, Kotb replaced Matt Lauer on Today and joined Savannah Guthrie full-time after he was ousted from the network amid his on-set sexual misconduct scandal. (In 2019, Kathie Lee Gifford left her show with Kotb and was replaced by Jenna Bush Hager.)
After Kotb quickly settled into the new gig, Kotb made headlines in February 2023 after missing several episodes of Today and Today With Hoda & Jenna. While Guthrie explained during the February 27 episode that “Hoda’s got the morning off,” she declined to reveal where the journalist was after more than one week off the air. Kotb, for her part, shared a cryptic message via social media that simply read “Choose Hope.” The NBC personality shares daughters Haley, whom she adopted in 2017, and Hope, whom she adopted in 2019, with ex-fiancé Joel Schiffman.
Two days after Guthrie’s brief explanation of her colleague’s whereabouts, coanchors Craig Melvin and Sheinelle Jones gave an update on Kotb’s absence, revealing that the Oklahoma native has “a family health matter that she’s been dealing with.” Melvin and Jones — who were filling in for both Kotb and Guthrie, who left the February 28 episode early after testing positive for COVID-19 — added, “We can tell you that Hoda’s OK.”
The four-time Emmy winner has dealt with multiple hardships throughout her life, including her breast cancer diagnosis and subsequent mastectomy, her divorce from ex-husband Burzis Kanga and her split from Schiffman.
Kotb, however, faced her roadblocks with a positive attitude and exclusively told Us Weekly in April 2022 that she was grateful for her “really nice, easy [coparenting] situation” with Schiffman.
“He sees the kids. He takes them to school some, and he sees them on weekends,” she shared with Us two months after announcing their split. “We’ve got a really nice, easy situation.”
She and Schiffman are trying their “best” while raising their two children, she added. “We make sure that the kids get plenty of him and plenty of me.”
Keep scrolling to see Kotb’s ups and downs through the years:
Sign up for Us Weekly’s free, daily newsletter and never miss breaking news or exclusive stories about your favorite celebrities, TV shows and more!
#Today #Show #Absence
