Jenna Bush Hager says being a "nepo baby" has driven her and twin sister Barbara to "work really hard" to prove people wrong who make assumptions about their lives.
"Nepo babies," short for nepotism babies, are children of famous people who others believe may have benefited from their parents' fame to receive professional opportunities.
Jenna and Barbara, 43, are the daughters of former President George W. Bush and the granddaughters of late President George H.W. Bush.
“Sometimes my children say ‘nepo babies,’ and I’m like, ‘I kind of am one, kids,’” Jenna said on TODAY with Jenna & Friends on Feb 19. “I think it’s hard because people want (nepo babies) to fail. Barbara and I are serious workaholics, and I’ve tried to figure out why. And I think it’s because we want to prove to people that it isn’t always easy, that we work really hard.”
The topic of nepo babies arose when Jenna's guest co-host, Justin Sylvester of E! News, brought up Patrick Schwarzenegger's performance on the newest season of the Max hit "The White Lotus."
Schwarzenegger is the son of action movie legend and former California governor Arnold Schwarzenegger and his ex-wife, Maria Shriver, an author, journalist and TODAY contributor.
Sylvester noted that nepo babies "have to work twice as hard because the eyes are on them — people want them to fail." Jenna pointed at herself as Sylvester said it.
The term came to prominence after New York magazine published an issue calling 2022 "the year of the nepo baby" in Hollywood and illustrating the famous families many young stars had come from.
While many nepo babies follow their parents into the same industry, Jenna and Barbara did not go into politics and instead have carved out their own separate niches.
Barbara has become an activist, mother and author. Jenna, in addition to hosting the fourth hour of TODAY, has become a force in the publishing world with her Read with Jenna book club and her own book imprint with Random House.
"I think if you ask people around (TODAY), they’ll say that (I work hard)," Jenna said. "That’s important, and I’m glad I work really hard, and I’m glad that I have the family that I have, but also I need to at some point be like, ‘OK, I did it. I proved it.'"
