How the White House turkey pardon became an American tradition

President Donald Trump pardoned two turkeys Tuesday — Gobble and Waddle — as part of an annual tradition that has occurred at the White House for more than 35 years. 

The Thanksgiving Turkey Pardoning is a ceremony originating from the National Thanksgiving Turkey Presentation dating back to the 1940s, when the National Turkey Federation would present the president with a live turkey for Thanksgiving. 

President John F. Kennedy is often credited with pardoning the first turkey in 1963, when he said that he would ‘let this one grow.’ Although Kennedy didn’t use the word ‘pardon,’ the L.A. Times reported on the matter with the headline, ‘Turkey gets presidential pardon,’ according to an NBC News archive. 

President Ronald Reagan also made a joke about pardoning that year’s turkey, Charlie, in response to a question from a reporter, according to the Ronald Reagan Presidential Library & Museum.

‘If they’d given me a different answer on Charlie and his future, I would have pardoned him,’ Reagan said in 1987. 

However, the tradition was codified during George H.W. Bush’s administration, according to the White House Historical Association. Bush used the word pardon, and the tradition continued each year afterward. 

‘But let me assure you, and this fine tom turkey, that he will not end up on anyone’s dinner table, not this guy — he’s presented a presidential pardon as of right now — and allow him to live out his days on a children’s farm not far from here,’ Bush said in 1989. 

Gobble and Waddle clocked in at 50 pounds and 52 pounds each, and traveled from North Carolina to the Washington’s Willard InterContinental Hotel for the annual tradition. Following the pardoning, they will head to North Carolina State University’s Prestage Department of Poultry Science.

During the ceremony in the Rose Garden, Trump also took aim at former President Joe Biden, and said Biden used the autopen to pardon the 2024 turkeys, and as a result those pardons were ‘totally invalid.’ 

As a result, Trump quipped that he had pardoned those turkeys too, and said he ‘saved them in the nick of time.’