During gloomy Washington Christmas, Trump takes kids' Santa calls

U.S. President Donald Trump and first lady Melania Trump participate in NORAD Santa tracker phone calls from the White House in Washington, U.S. December 24, 2018. REUTERS/Jonathan Ernst

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - It was the night before Christmas, and U.S. President Donald Trump was on the phone with children, peppering them with questions about whether they were looking forward to the holiday.

Every Christmas Eve, the North American Aerospace Defense Command in Colorado Springs, Colorado, claims to track Santa Claus' flight across the globe, a tradition dating to 1955, when a department store printed the phone number of a NORAD colonel in a Christmas newspaper ad by mistake.