Hockaday alum Jenna Bush Hager spoke in defense of her father George W. Bush’s friendship with Ellen DeGeneres, according to Yahoo News.

The relationship was spotlighted after the two sat together at a Dallas Cowboys game.

“So many of us miss a time where people who have different opinions get along,” Hager said. “And I yearn for that. I want my kids to realize that we live in a world when people are think tons of different things and we treat everybody with respect and kindness. And so just like Ellen, my dad does that. And if you ask anybody that’s worked for him or knows him, plenty of the people that worked for him have different opinions or different lifestyles, thought different things and felt comfortable sharing that with him because he’s open.

“My dad likes people that think differently than him, that believe differently, and people are surprised by this. But my parents raised both Barbara and I had to have our own opinions,” she said. “Barbara and I were sitting around the kitchen table, and obviously we talked about a lot of mundane things, but if we had opinions we were allowed to share them.”