The history of White House Thanksgiving traditions date back more than 160 years to President Abraham Lincoln, who established the national holiday. 

During his time in office, Lincoln issued a proclamation calling for the celebration of Thanksgiving, triumphing over similar efforts of presidents who came before him, according to the National Park Service. 

The official designation of the annual national holiday is due, in part, to writer Sarah Josepha Hale. The NPS notes that in 1827 — as editor of “Boston’s Ladies Magazine” — Hale began writing essays calling for the national holiday. Finally, on Sept. 18, 1863, she wrote to Lincoln asking him to use his presidential powers to create the holiday. 

Lincoln obliged and a few weeks later, on Oct. 3, 1863 — during the height of the Civil War — he issued the Thanksgiving Proclamation. Ever since, the country has celebrated Thanksgiving Day. 

But it wasn’t until after a bill passed by Congress on Dec. 26, 1941, that made the holiday fall annually on the fourth Thursday in November. 

Thanksgiving at the White House is usually relatively quiet and includes the tradition of pardoning lucky turkeys from their doomed fate of the dinner table. 

Presidential turkey pardons

The first turkey pardon ever issued is believed to have been by Lincoln as recorded by White House reporter Noah Brooks in an 1865 dispatch, according to the White House Historical Association. 

Lincoln had granted clemency to a turkey named Jack belonging to his son Tad Lincoln, that had originally been slated to be gobbled up at the family’s Christmas dinner in 1863. 

But the annual practice in which the White House sent pardoned presentation turkeys to a farm to live out their days did not occur until Ronald Reagan’s presidency in the 1980s, the WHHA says. In decades prior, presidents would occasionally receive turkeys from the poultry industry and decide not to eat them without an official pardon. 

The WHHA notes the practice of sending presentation turkeys to the president became a norm in 1981, and the pardoning ceremonies quickly became a national sensation. By 1989, the annual tradition materialized with President George H.W. Bush — as documented by the association — speaking to the pardoned turkey, saying the line his successors still reprise at ceremonies today: “He’s granted a presidential pardon as of right now.”

On Monday, President Biden issued the final two turkey pardons of his term, to Peach and Blossom, sending them to live out the rest of their lives at Minnesota’s Farmamerica as poultry ambassadors for agricultural students.

Gathering with family and friends

Aside from the turkey pardoning spectacle, presidents spend Thanksgiving in the same fashion as households across the country. 

The first documented Thanksgiving gathering at the White House dates back to Nov. 28, 1878, according to the WHHA. Then-President Rutherford B. Hayes held a large Thanksgiving dinner gathering with his family and private secretaries, singing hymns in the Red Room afterward and inviting African-American staff to enjoy their own Thanksgiving meal in the State Dining Room. 

The tradition has since withstood the test of time. Through economic hardship and times of wars, presidents have carved out time for family. The WHHA notes that President Woodrow Wilson’s first Thanksgiving meal during World War I on Nov. 29, 1917, was an economical one — and one without cranberries. 

In recent decades, presidents have taken to the tradition of celebrating the holiday outside the White House at their so-called “go-to” vacation spots. President Ronald Reagan in 1985 traveled to the family ranch in Santa Barbara, California. 

President-elect Donald Trump spent all but one Thanksgiving of his first term at his Mar-a-Lago estate in West Palm Beach, Florida. President Biden has spent every Thanksgiving during his term with family in Nantucket, Massachusetts as the Biden family has for over 40 years.

Experts are warning that fraudsters are exploiting Black Friday sales to target U.S. shoppers with fake websites and ads for major brands like IKEA, Wayfair and The North Face, after online scams hit record highs in 2023.

A new report released by threat intelligence company EclecticIQ identified a campaign that operates a sprawling network of fabricated websites using “Trusted Store” badges to lure shoppers with fake products.

When consumers attempt to make a purchase, scammers steal their personal and payment information. The consumers are often unaware they were scammed until they fail to receive the product.

Reports of online fraud in 2023 exceeded $12.5 billion in potential losses — a 22% jump from 2022, according to FBI data. Officials say increasingly sophisticated scams are using tools including AI to power their campaigns. 

“With the way it now seems like everyone is shopping online, reliance on digital platforms has handed these groups a wider attack surface than ever,” EclecticIQ CEO Cody Barrow told CBS News. “Unfortunately, it’s likely we’ll see its impact stretch into next week.”

The scams

EclecticIQ says it identified at least 8,000 fabricated sites that lure shoppers by offering steep “deals” on popular brands. The websites are not affiliated with the brands they appear to represent, but are designed to look like official sites and use URLs that appear authentic. 

In one example, a site posing as Wayfair used the URL wayfairtoday.com. Another site used the URL wayfairblackfriday.com. The website was registered in early November and offered fake “deals” including an $800 mattress reduced to $39. 

CBS News also found an ad appropriating Wayfair’s logo that directed users to another counterfeit site posing as the retailer. It was removed from Meta’s ad library as of Friday. Wayfair told CBS News that it is actively monitoring scams to ensure customers are protected.

Analysts discovered Mandarin coding and Chinese IP addresses on the sites, indicating that the phishing campaign was operated by a China-based group. IKEA told CBS News it was investigating one of the scam websites using its name that EclecticIQ identified.

Separately, an ad on Facebook and Instagram using The North Face logo routed users to a fabricated site. The ad was removed for policy violations, and The North Face told CBS News it was working with Meta and “other partners” to combat scam sites.

“Scammers use every online platform available to them and constantly evolve their tactics in order to evade enforcement,” said Meta spokesperson Erin Logan. “In this instance, our systems proactively detected and removed a number of these ads before they were reported to us.”

The Federal Trade Commission released data in February that shows online shopping fraud was the second most common type of fraud reported in 2023.

Experts say fraudulent sites and ads remain a pervasive issue. “Many of the scam sites are short-lived campaigns, so it’s an ongoing effort to identify new sites,” Ilya Volovik, director of Recorded Future Payment Fraud Intelligence, told CBS News. “Some of the longer living scam sites change their ‘sales’ advertisement based on a holiday.”

Tips to protect yourself

Cliff Steinhauer, director of Information Security and Engagement at the National Cybersecurity Alliance, said consumers should take precautions, stay alert when online shopping and act quickly if they believe they have been scammed. 

Secure your accounts. Experts recommend setting up multifactor authentication as well as strong and unique passwords for all accounts, including shopping and bank sites.

Avoid unfamiliar links: Be wary of links from unsolicited emails and text messages. Instead, use a search engine to navigate to the retailer’s website. 

Look for red flags. Be wary of deals that appear too good to be true, as well as websites that use excessive pop-ups and urgent language. If in doubt, leave the site.

Research the website. Look up reviews from other shoppers who have used the site. Visit the Better Business Bureau’s website, which maintains a database with ratings for millions of businesses.

If you think you have been the victim of fraud, immediately notify your bank to reverse the charges. You should also change the passwords to your online accounts. File a police report if you experience harassment or repeated attempts to steal more of your information.

Experts also recommend freezing your credit on the three major credit reporting bureaus if your personal information has been compromised through a data breach. This will ensure your identity can’t be stolen in the event that scammers obtain your social security number.

In the remotest reaches of Alaska, there’s no relying on DoorDash to have Thanksgiving dinner — or any dinner — delivered. But some residents living well off the grid nevertheless have turkeys this holiday, thanks to the Alaska Turkey Bomb.

For the third straight year, a resident named Esther Keim has been flying low and slow in a small plane over rural parts of south-central Alaska, dropping frozen turkeys to those who can’t simply run out to the grocery store.

Alaska is mostly wilderness, with only about 20% of it accessible by road. In winter, many who live in remote areas rely on small planes or snowmobiles to travel any distance, and frozen rivers can act as makeshift roads.

When Keim was growing up on an Alaska homestead, a family friend would airdrop turkeys to her family and others nearby for the holidays. Other times, the pilot would deliver newspapers, sometimes with a pack of gum inside for Keim.

Her family moved to more urban Alaska nearly 25 years ago but still has the homestead. Using a small plane she had rebuilt with her father, Keim launched her turkey delivery mission a few years back after learning of a family living off the land nearby who had little for Thanksgiving dinner.

“They were telling me that a squirrel for dinner did not split very far between three people,” Keim recalled. “At that moment, I thought … ‘I’m going to airdrop them a turkey.'”

She decided not to stop there. Her effort has grown by word of mouth and by social media posts. This year, she’s delivering 32 frozen turkeys to people living year-round in cabins where there are no roads.

All but two had been delivered by Tuesday, with delivery plans for the last two birds thwarted by Alaska’s unpredictable weather.

Among the beneficiaries are Dave and Christina Luce, who live on the Yentna River about 45 miles (72 kilometers) northwest of Anchorage. They have stunning mountain views in every direction, including North America’s tallest mountain, Denali, directly to the north. But in the winter it’s a 90-minute snowmobile ride to the nearest town, which they do about once a month.

“I’m 80 years old now, so we make fewer and fewer trips,” Dave Luce said. “The adventure has sort of gone out of it.”

They’ve known Keim since she was little. The 12-pound (5.44-kilogram) turkey she delivered will provide more than enough for them and a few neighbors.

“It makes a great Thanksgiving,” Dave Luce said. “She’s been a real sweetheart, and she’s been a real good friend.”

Keim makes 30 to 40 turkey deliveries yearly, flying as far as 100 miles (161 kilometers) from her base north of Anchorage toward Denali’s foothills.

Sometimes she enlists the help of a “turkey dropper” to ride along and toss the birds out. Other times, she’s the one dropping turkeys while her friend Heidi Hastings pilots her own plane.

Keim buys about 20 turkeys at a time, with the help of donations, usually by people reaching out to her through Facebook. She wraps them in plastic garbage bags and lets them sit in the bed of her pickup until she can arrange a flight.

“Luckily it’s cold in Alaska, so I don’t have to worry about freezers,” she said.

She contacts families on social media to let them know of impending deliveries, and then they buzz the house so the homeowners will come outside.

“We won’t drop the turkey until we see them come out of the house or the cabin, because if they don’t see it fall, they’re not going to know where to look,” she said.

It can be especially difficult to find the turkey if there’s deep snow. A turkey was once missing for five days before it was found, but the only casualty so far has been a lost ham, Keim said.

Keim prefers to drop the turkey on a frozen lake if possible so it’s easy to locate.

“As far as precision and hitting our target, I am definitely not the best aim,” she joked. “I’ve gotten better, but I have never hit a house, a building, person or dog.”

Her reward is the great responses she gets from families, some who record her dropping the turkeys and send her videos and texts of appreciation.

“They just think it’s so awesome that we throw these things out of the plane,” Keim said.

Ultimately, she hopes to set up a nonprofit organization to solicit more donations and reach people across a bigger swath of the state. And it doesn’t have to stop at turkeys.

“There’s so many kids out in the villages,” she said. “It would be cool to maybe add a stuffed animal or something they can hold.”