It’s been nearly two months since Nancy Guthrie, the 84 year-old mother of the TODAY show host Savannah Guthrie, went missing from her home in Tucson, Arizona.
On Friday, we reported that Savannah, 54, had revealed that she will be returning to her hosting duties on TODAY on Monday, April 6. Now, experts are revealing how Savannah returning to TODAY might actually help find her kidnapped mom.
‘Savannah Has A Platform…’
“Savannah has a platform most families do not have, and she is using it,” the former FBI agent Jason Pack told Page Six.
“Every morning that she sits behind that desk, her mother’s face will stay in front of millions of people. That matters,” he continued. “That is fighting back the only way she can right now and gives her control over how she and her family choose to navigate the worst thing that has ever happened to them.”
“I think the bottom line is this: You might be able to kidnap someone’s mamma, but you sure as heck can’t kidnap their backbone,” Pack added. “The strength you see in people during these cases never stops surprising you.”
Pack concluded by saying that you hold onto what you can control and show up.
“You do not hand the people who did this any more than they have already taken,” he explained. “That is the definition of strength. Plain and simple.”
Nancy Disappears
Nancy was last seen on the night of Saturday, January 31. That evening, she had dinner with her daughter Annie and son-in-law Tommaso Cioni. They dropped her off at home afterwards at around 9:45pm, and she tragically hasn’t been seen since.
A masked intruder was captured on Nancy’s doorbell ring camera in the early hours of February 1. He managed to cover the camera with some plants before moving forward with the kidnapping.
It has since been revealed that the masked man had been seen in the doorbell ring camera prior to the night Nancy was taken. This indicates that he may have been casing out her home.
Savannah’s TODAY Return
Hoda Kotb, who has been filling in for her during her absence, revealed on Friday that Savannah will be returning on Monday, April 6.
“We cannot wait to welcome her to Studio 1A,” Savannah’s co-anchor Craig Melvin said on air.
This came minutes after the second part of Savannah’s interview with Hoda was shown.
“It’s hard to imagine doing it because it’s such a place of joy and lightness and I can’t come back and try to be something that I’m not,” Savannah said of returning to TODAY. “But I can’t not come back because it’s my family. I think it’s part of my purpose right now. I want to smile. And when I do, it will be real. And my joy will be my protest. My joy will be my answer. And being there is joyful. And when it’s not, I’ll say so. I have been so grateful to have this family. I consider this my family, my greater family, and when times are hard, you want to be with your family. And I want to be with my family.”
“I don’t know if I can do it,” she continued. “I don’t know if I’ll belong anymore, but I would like to try, I would like to try. I’m not gonna be the same, but maybe it’s like that old poem, more beautiful in the broken places.”
This has clearly been an excruciatingly difficult time for Savannah and her entire family. Please join us in saying a prayer for the return of Nancy Guthrie.