This year, Jenna Bush Hager caught Hoda Kotb’s secret signal during the Macy’s Thanksgiving Day Parade.
“So thankful for my most hilarious and LOYAL @hodakotb who always comes through!” Bush Hager, 43, captioned an Instagram video on Thursday, November 28. “With assist by my dearest @savannahguthrie !!! That was a (not so!) secret dance move!”
Kotb, 60, could be seen shaking her arms at the camera as Chappell Roan’s “Hot to Go” played in the background. Cohost Savannah Guthrie attempted to copy the dance move but couldn’t stop laughing.
“We did it 100 times before the camera actually caught it 
JENNA BUSH HAGGAH,” Guthrie, 52, commented on Bush Hager’s social media post. “Third time was the charm.”
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Earlier this week, Kotb promised to send a secret sign to Bush Hager during Thursday’s live parade coverage.
“Last year, Hoda and I came up with this secret symbol, which was Hoda brushing her teeth with a finger,” Bush Hager explained during the Wednesday, November 27 episode of Today With Hoda & Jenna.
“I’ve been thinking, like, ‘What could it possibly be?’ And there’s only one thing it could be,” Kotb said, explaining that she stole the dance move from Matt Rodgers’ “RockaFellaCenta” music video.
Rodgers, 34, sings a line about Bush Hager in the video while his “Las Culturistas” podcast cohost, Bowen Yang, shakes his arms in front of his chest. That particular dance move was Kotb’s secret signal.
“So, whenever I see Jenna, I go like this [dances],” Kotb said, doing her own version of the move on Wednesday’s episode. Bush Hager noted that they “do it together,” likening the dance to their “call sign.”
Last year, Bush Hager actually missed the secret sign in real-time due to a mishap at home.
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“Our [Christmas] tree fell over at the beginning of the parade with all the stuff on it,” Bush Hager recalled on Wednesday. “I had paused [the parade] because I was looking for [Hoda’s signal], and somebody texted me and tons [social media users said], ‘Hey Jenna, go, go. She did it, she did it.’ So then, we got to watch.”
She eventually posted a screenshot of Kotb, who had a finger on her two front teeth.
“What a true one @hodakotb! Her secret sign!!!” Bush Hager captioned her November 2023 Instagram post.
This year’s Thanksgiving Day Parade was a special one for Kotb, as it was her last one as an NBC host. The anchor announced in September that she would be retiring from the Today show.
“I realized that it was time for me to turn the page at 60, and to try something new,” she revealed during the September 26 broadcast. “This is the right time for me to move on.”
