“Today” co-anchor Craig Melvin sat beside Hoda Kotb Friday morning, listening as the interim host held the spotlight while discussing her interview with their colleague Savannah Guthrie, who tearfully revealed “the agony” her family has endured since their 84-year-old mother was kidnapped from her Arizona home on Feb. 1.

Melvin then responded collegially after Kotb made the big announcement that Guthrie would return to her “Today” hosting duties on April 6, the day after Easter, taking her place “next to this wonderful human, Craig.”

Picking up his cue, Melvin said of Guthrie: “Because she is not going to let sadness win. Joy is going to be her protest. It is where she belongs. It is where we all want her to be.”

But as much as Guthrie has called the “Today” show her “family” — and as much as Melvin and Kotb put on a display of professional unity Friday morning — a new Daily Mail report tells a different story about behind-the-scenes tensions among the on-air hosts and executives at the NBC morning news show.

The tensions center on Melvin’s belief that it “was almost guaranteed” that he, not Kotb, would get to do the show’s high-profile, potentially ratings-busting interview with Guthrie, the Daily Mail reported. Melvin assumed co-anchor duties with Guthrie after Kotb left in 2025 to spend more time with family, and he believed that a major interview with Guthrie would mark “a major step” in his career.

The broadcaster was therefore “completely blindsided” when executives chose Kotb to do the interview, the Daily Mail added. Kotb, who remains under contract with NBC News, has been filling in as co-anchor with Melvin since Guthrie took a leave of absence after learning that her mother had vanished from her Tucson, Arizona, home on Feb. 1.

“Craig is absolutely devastated he didn’t get that interview,” an insider told the Daily Mail. “He thought it was his moment with Savannah — and it never even came his way.”

“He wasn’t just passed over — he wasn’t even asked,” the insider said. “That’s what really stings.”

The interview was taped, with the bulk of it airing Thursday and more of it airing on Friday. Melvin, who has been on the “Today” show since 2018, felt that he had earned the opportunity to handle such a newsworthy, high-stakes event, according to the Daily Mail.

“Craig believed he’d earned that spot. He is the official co-host,” the insider continued. “So to be left out entirely feels like a major setback. He doesn’t understand why he wasn’t given the opportunity. Hoda walked away from the seat. It’s not fair.”

Variety reported that Kotb was likely chosen to do the interview because she is “a personality familiar to audiences as the guide of what is likely to be a delicate exchange.” Kotb, who has remained under contact with NBC News, also is an insider who is familiar with Guthrie and the morning-show audience but has some degree of “removal” from the situation.

But this is the second Daily Mail report that presents an unflattering portrait of backstage drama at “Today” amid Guthrie’s nearly two-month absence. Earlier this month, insiders described a “viper’s nest” of power struggles, in which staffers are driven by self-interest and on-air colleagues are looking for ways to get more time on screen while she’s been away.

“You think ‘The Morning Show’ is bad? That’s nothing,” one source told the Daily Mail, referring to the behind-the-scenes backstabbing in the Jennifer Aniston and Reese Witherspoon Apple TV drama.

While Guthrie has been in Arizona to be with her family, NBC and the “Today” show have joined other news outlets from around the country in covering the search for her mother and the investigation into her kidnapping. The “Today” show’s connection to the case has placed the network in a tricky situation for a news organization trying to report on it objectively, though this connection also has brought rewards, according to Variety. Viewership for the “Today” show has surged since Nancy Guthrie’s abduction, bringing it an average audience of 3.1 million people during the first quarter of 2026 and putting it ahead of its competitors, ABC’s “Good Morning America” and CBS’ “CBS Mornings,” Variety reported, citing data from Nielsen.

During the interview, Guthrie shared new details about her mother’s disappearance, such as back doors of her mother’s home that were found “propped open” when her sister and brother-in-law went to check on her the morning of Feb. 1. Guthrie also revealed that the family and police still don’t know why Nancy Guthrie was kidnapped and tearfully said she believes that her fame may have made her mother a target.

“We are in agony. We are in agony. It is unbearable,” Guthrie told Kotb, adding: “She needs to come home now.”

Now, the fact that Kotb got to do this interview has left Melvin concerned about his future on the show, sources told the Daily Mail. A “Today” show source insisted to the Daily Mail that “Craig was looped in and fully supportive of Savannah’s interview with Hoda.”

But that’s not what other insiders are telling the Daily Mail.

“The rug was pulled out from under him,” an insider said. “He went from confident to uncertain overnight. It’s not just disappointment, it’s doubt.”

Melvin has become especially concerned after learning that Guthrie would return to work, the source added. “This has shaken him. There’s growing concern behind the scenes. If he’s not getting interviews like this, where does he really stand?”

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