{"id":505777,"date":"2026-03-05T19:37:09","date_gmt":"2026-03-05T19:37:09","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/505777\/"},"modified":"2026-03-05T19:37:09","modified_gmt":"2026-03-05T19:37:09","slug":"savannah-guthrie-returns-to-visit-today","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/505777\/","title":{"rendered":"Savannah Guthrie Returns to Visit ‘Today’"},"content":{"rendered":"

\n\tSavannah Guthrie<\/a> returned to NBC\u2019s \u201cToday\u201d on Thursday \u2014 but not on camera.<\/p>\n

\n\tThe co-host visited with colleagues in her first appearance at NBC since her mother, Nancy, was abducted January 31. The case remains open and authorities have not publicly identified a person of interest.<\/p>\n

\n\t\u201cSavannah Guthrie stopped by the studio this morning to be with and thank her \u2018Today\u2019 colleagues,\u201d NBC News<\/a> said in a statement. \u201cWhile she plans to return to the show on air, she remains focused right now supporting her family and working to help bring Nancy home.\u201d<\/p>\n

\n\tAnchors at the long-running A.M. franchise\u00a0have grappled with many challenges over the years,<\/a>\u00a0ranging from personal health issues to talent transitions, but these past months have\u00a0presented a set of circumstances that are believed to be without parallel<\/a>: An agonizing search for Nancy Guthrie around her home in Arizona has been in process for weeks, leaving producers not only to manage coverage thoughtfully, but also to ponder\u00a0how to fill Savannah Guthrie\u2019s seat for an undefined interim<\/a>.<\/p>\n

\n\tHow has \u201cToday\u201d handled the matter?<\/a>\u00a0Hoda Kotb, the veteran \u201cToday\u201d co-anchor who left full-time duties early last year, has rejoined the show on an interim basis, and is holding forth with Craig Melvin. Kotb will stay while Guthrie is with her family, according to a person familiar with the matter. Guthrie is expected to return to the show on her own timeline<\/a>, even if she requires a significant period to feel ready to do so, this person says. On some days, Sheinelle Jones has co-anchored alongside Melvin.<\/p>\n

\n\tHaving Kotb on hand offers a viable solution<\/a>\u00a0for NBC and \u201cToday\u201d producers. She\u2019s already affiliated with the show, and adding someone new to the mix during such a difficult moment could be ill advised The introduction of someone less known to viewers to fill in more regularly for Guthrie \u2014 even on an interim basis \u2014 could alienate the audience, which has a years-long relationship with her and doesn\u2019t want to see her treated poorly, particularly under duress. The first two hours of \u201cToday\u201d generated nearly $203.5 million in 2025, according to Guideline, a tracker of ad spending.<\/p>\n

\n\tAudiences continue to watch the show in larger numbers \u2014 even after NBC\u2019s coverage of the Winter Olympics has wound down. For the five days ended February 27, \u201cToday\u201d captured an average of 3.32 million viewers overall and 638,000 among viewers between 25 and 54, the audience coveted most by advertisers in news programming. The overall audience for \u201cToday\u201d was up 19% over the year-earlier period, while viewership in the demo fell 6% \u2014 a potential warning sign, as the same group rose 13% at rival ABC\u2019s \u201cGood Morning America.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Savannah Guthrie returned to NBC\u2019s \u201cToday\u201d on Thursday \u2014 but not on camera. The co-host visited with colleagues…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":505778,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[33],"tags":[88,61226,66501,1256],"class_list":{"0":"post-505777","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-entertainment","8":"tag-entertainment","9":"tag-nbc-news","10":"tag-savannah-guthrie","11":"tag-today-show"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/505777","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=505777"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/505777\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/505778"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=505777"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=505777"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=505777"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}