Savannah Guthrie to return to ‘Today’ on April 6 after mother’s disappearance

‘Today’ show host Savannah Guthrie is speaking out in her first interview after her mother was kidnapped from her Arizona home.

As she continues to beg for help in the search for her 84-year-old mother, “Today” show cohost Savannah Guthrie will return to the program April 6, her colleagues announced.

“I don’t know if I can do it,” Guthrie said in an NBC interview with Hoda Kotb that aired Friday. “I don’t know if I’ll belong anymore. And I would like to try. I would like to try.”

“I can’t not come back,” Guthrie continued. “This is my family. I think it’s part of my purpose right now.”

Nancy Guthrie was last seen on the night of January 31 and reported missing the next day from her home in the Catalina Foothills of Tucson, Arizona.

Though authorities believe she was abducted – and the case has captured enormous public attention – purported ransom notes, video of an intruder outside her home and copious tips have not produced any public leads.

Still, through her agony, Savannah Guthrie feels she wants to go back to work, she said.

“I want to smile, and when I do, it will be real, and my joy will be my protest,” she said. “Being there is joyful, and when it’s not, I’ll say so.”

Guthrie feels guilt – and certainty her mother didn’t walk away

Friday’s segment capped off the news program’s rollout of the emotionally raw and astonishingly candid interview Guthrie, 54, sat down for with Kotb, her primary substitute for the past seven weeks. Both hosts often wept as Guthrie described her emotional journey through the increasingly discouraging investigation into her mother’s whereabouts.

“I don’t know that it’s because she’s my mom, and somebody thought, ‘That lady has money, we could make a quick buck,’” Guthrie said in a segment aired Thursday.

“I just say, ‘I’m so sorry, Mommy. I’m so sorry.’”

Guthrie’s family received a number of ransom notes, but they believe only two were legitimate, the broadcaster said.

The family put out video responses to the notes – one of which promised, “We will pay.” But the Guthries – Savannah and her siblings, Annie and Camron – never got any assurance the purported kidnappers would return their mother.

Although they have had no sign of what happened to Nancy Guthrie, the family is certain she did not simply wander away from home, saying a bad back made it impossible for her to walk any significant distance. The medication she takes every day was left behind in the house, investigators said.

“There was no ‘wander off,’” Savannah Guthrie said during a portion of the interview aired Thursday.

That belief seemed to be bolstered by a disturbing video recovered from Nancy Guthrie’s doorbell camera, showing a person covered from head to toe approaching the house in the middle of the night with a gun, first attempting to cover the camera before removing it entirely.

The suspect in the video is described as male and about 5-foot-9 to -10, with an average build. His backpack was identified as a black, 25-liter Ozark Trail Hiker Pack.

The search for that suspect has been a key focus of the investigation led by the Pima County Sheriff’s Department, which has a 20- to 24-person task force dedicated to it. Investigators say tens of thousands of tips have poured in, but they have still announced no suspects in the case.

The Guthrie family last week asked the community to stay vigilant.

“We continue to believe it is Tucsonans, and the greater southern Arizona community, that hold the key to finding resolution in this case,” they said in a statement.

‘Today’ colleagues express sadness and support

The disappearance of Guthrie has torn not only at her own family but also at the staff of the “Today” show, which aired lengthy segments devoted to the case in its initial days and emotional pleas from the show’s other hosts.

Kotb, who first became associated with the program in 2007, was the official cohost with Guthrie from 2018 until last year.

“I think there’s, like, this helpless feeling,” Kotb said when she began substituting for Guthrie last month. “I mean, we’re all so close with her, and we all want to help her.”

Although the taped interview with Kotb is Savannah Guthrie’s first appearance on the show since the abduction, Guthrie returned to Studio 1A in New York on March 5 after the morning program was over for an off-camera expression of gratitude to her colleagues.

“I really wanted to come and see everybody,” Guthrie said in the interview aired Friday. “I just love this beautiful place that we call home, where we get to come and be every day.”

By Andy Rose, CNN