24 November 2017 - National Thanksgiving Turkey Presentation

Julia Manchester (The Hill, 19/11/2017)

The White House turkeys have officially arrived in Washington, D.C., for the pardoning ceremony, which is set to take place on Tuesday.
The White House announced the news on its Snapchat and Instagram accounts.
The White House confirmed to The Hill that the two birds will be staying in the Willard Intercontinental Hotel, where rooms reportedly can cost between $200 to $3,500 per night.
 

Gobble Gobble: rating Trump's Performance at the White House Turkey Pardon
Troy Patterson (The New Yorker, 21/11/2017)

This morning, at 10:58 A.M., on MSNBC, Hallie Jackson closed her daily hour at the anchor desk by teasing a trip into the field. She explained that she had witnessed the National Thanksgiving Turkey Presentation—“one of my very favorite White House traditions”—six times since arriving in Washington, and that she was heading to the Rose Garden for President Trump’s first such ceremony. Jackson provided a short history of this hallowed pseudo-event, describing how the turkey presentation became a ritualized pardon under George H. W. Bush—as opposed to a prelude to a Presidential dinner at home, à la Truman and Eisenhower. She introduced a photograph, taken a day earlier, of Wishbone and Drumstick, the turkeys due at this year’s ceremony. Shot by a White House photographer, the picture found each turkey, with its scarlet neck and violet head and flaccid snood, standing on its own bed in a room at the Willard. By the way, this is why, even when staying at a five-star hotel, I always turn back the duvet first thing.
Jackson engaged the hosts of the 11 A.M. MSNBC show, “Velshi & Ruhle.” The incoming anchors were eager to bandy the topic for a long moment, sportily, as if taking a deep breath of fresh air before plunging into a waste container of sex-crime headlines at the top of the hour. Ali Velshi wondered if putting the turkeys up at such a nice place was, from the birds’ perspective, a misguided effort at luxury: “They’ve never stayed in a hotel before.”
Read on...

National Thanksgiving Turkey Pardoning Ceremony
Office of the Press Secretary (The White House, 16/11/2017)