“Turkeys don’t vote for Christmas” is a popular politican saying in the United Kingdom, where Christmas turkey is a famous dish. If turkeys were allowed to vote, they would never vote for Christmas. The saying means that people don’t vote against their interests.
 
“Turkey’s don’t vote for Christmas” has been cited in print since at least the 1970s.
   
 
Wikipedia: Turkeys voting for Christmas
Turkeys voting for Christmas is an English idiom used as a metaphor or simile (in the construct “like turkeys voting for Christmas”) in reference to an apparently suicidal (“death-wish”) choice, especially a political vote. In modern times, in the United Kingdom, turkeys are commonly eaten as part of the English Christmas dinner. Since 1573 they have been available in the UK at Christmas.
 
The Oxford Dictionary of Quotations writes that a commentator in the Independent Magazine traced the origin of the phrase to British Liberal Party politician David Penhaligon, who is quoted as saying: “Us voting for the Pact is like a turkey voting for Christmas” in reference to the Lib-Lab Pact which he opposed.
   
Google Books
The Pact:
The Inside Story of the Lib-Lab Government, 1977-8
By Alistair Michie and Simon Hoggart
London: Quartet Books
1978
Pg. 156:
‘Us voting for the Pact is like a turkey voting for Christmas’, said David Penhaligon.
       
Google News Archive
17 June 1986, Bryan (OH) Times, “Voters to decide divorce” by Mary Davis (UPI from Dublin, Ireland), pg. 9, col. 3:
“A woman voting for divorce is like a turkey voting for Christmas.”
(Alice Glenn, a Fianna Fail party representative.—ed.)
 
Google Books
After Eden:
Facing the Challenge of Gender Reconciliation
By Mary Stewart Van Leeuwen
Grand Rapids, MI: William B. Eerdmans Publishing Company
1993
Pg. 527:
Some women who picketed against more lenient divorce laws in Ireland in the 1980s displayed signs reading, “A woman who votes for easier divorce laws is like a turkey voting for Christmas!”
 
Google Books
Pandemonium:
Towards a Retro-Organization Theory
By Gibson Burrell
Thousand Oaks, CA: SAGE Publications Inc.
1997
Pg. 174:
Even corporate turkeys don’t vote for Christmas.
 
OCLC WorldCat record
Turkeys don’t vote for Christmas
Author: P A Lester
Publisher: Birmingham : Protean, ©1998.
Edition/Format:   Print book : English
 
OCLC WorldCat record
TURKEYS DON’T VOTE FOR CHRISTMAS? AN ANALYSIS OF HORIZONTAL FISCAL EQUALISATION EXPERIENCES IN AUSTRALIA AND THE UNITED KINGDOM
Author: MARK McGOVERN; KAY ADRIAN; BRISTOW GILLIAN; PICKERNELL DAVID
Edition/Format: Article Article : English
Publication: Economic Papers: A journal of applied economics and policy, v21 n4 (200212): 81-94
Database: CrossRef
 
Google Groups: alt.sex.spanking.moderated
Reprieved turkeys vote for Christmas
Alex Birch
9/19/04
(...)
Don’t you have that expression over there ‘Turkeys don’t vote for Christmas!’ meaning that vested interest groups will never vote for something which will have an adverse effect on them or theirs.
 
English Idioms
Thursday, May 26, 2011
Turkeys Voting for Christmas
Turkey is a traditional Christmas holiday meal in the United Kingdom, Canada, and the United States. No one asks turkey birds themselves whether they believe Christmas is a good thing. If anyone was to put Christmas to a vote among turkeys, it is strongly assumed turkeys would vote Christmas out of existence.
 
This silly scenario gives rise to the idiom, “Turkeys voting for Christmas.” In other words, this is an idiom for people voting against their own best interests, individually and as a group. This is usually brought up in the context of how people, as a rule, don’t vote for something obviously against their own interests.
   
Google Books
Turkeys Don’t Vote: Politics for Beginners
Front Cover
Diana Z. Elliott
AuthorHouse, Feb 17, 2015 - Juvenile Nonfiction - 86 pages
No matter what you vote, the same old party keeps coming back, same old lies-you’ve given up and don’t vote anymore. Find out how the system has trained you to do what it wants. People actually have a lot of power but do not know how to use that power. This book in simple English shows you with the aid of cartoons how the system divides and conquers and gets you to do what it wants-give up and not vote, then try to vote for some minor party whose policies then disappears into oblivion. Yet another cycle of give up, vote, give up, vote, etc. Learn to beat the system and get what you want.
 
Twitter
LawrenceMcNeill ⛔️✌️
‏@ljam185
Turkeys don’t vote for Christmas and Right Wing politicians don’t vote for an equal society.
Corps & the 1% make it worth their while.
3:19 AM - 13 Aug 2015
Glasgow, Scotland