The Bush Sisters Talk Politics And Prose

The Bush Sisters Talk Politics And Prose

- Sarah Begley

’TIS THE SEASON OF THE POLITICAL MEMOIR, even for those who avoided last year’s electionglare. Barbara Bush and Jenna Bush Hager are the latest to jump on the bandwagon with Sisters First, a book that couldn’t be called a tell-all—its revealing, not shocking—but that breaks ranks with their Republican dynasty.In alternating chapters, the former First Daughters recount stories about everything from their childhood in Midland, Texas (with visits to their presidential grandfather George H.W. Bush), through their father George W. Bush’s White House years to Jenna’s current career as an NBC News correspondent and Barbara’s work as CEO and co-founder of the nonprofit Global Health Corps.

The 2016 election prompted them to write the book. Barbara, already well on the record in favor of same-sex marriage, voted for Hillary Clinton in 2016. Jenna wrote to Michelle Obama asking for advice on how to talk to her two daughters after Donald Trump’s victory. She says Sisters First was above all a way of celebrating sisterhood. “If women everywhere had this, felt this empowerment—whether it’s through a sibling or a friend or a colleague or whatever it is—maybe we’d be in a place where we felt better about the state of women in our country,” Jenna says.

Among all First Children, Jenna and Barbara are the only twins—and they think that has made all the difference. “Having a twin meant that we had a partner going through everything at the same time as we were, whether that was going to school on the first day or going to our dad’s Inauguration,” says Barbara. “I think to have a partner that’s your same age, not someone that is more mature and has a different view of the world than you, but someone that’s experiencing the world in the same age and the same way as you, has been tremendously lucky.”