Big Bird's Big Battle

Once a wholesome haven for American kids, Sesame Street now sits at the messy intersection of politics, algorithms and shifting values

- by JESÚS MESA

THERE WAS A TIME WHEN AMERI-can parents had no hesitation about plopping their kids in front of the television.

For decades, shows like Sesame Street were, in addition to being often the only thing available, were considered safe havens for children—wholesome, educational programming that helped youngsters learn the alphabet, basic math and even gave lessons about morality and what it meant to be a kid. But today, not even Elmo is safe from the nation's culture wars or the rapidly shifting dynamics of the media business.

Funding Pressure

Sesame Street is one of the longest-running shows on TV, having premiered during the Nixon administration in 1969. The program's structure is complicated. It is produced by Sesame Workshop, a nonprofit that collaborates with Public Broadcasting Service, which has distributed Sesame Street to its member stations for decades. The Corporation for Public Broadcasting helps fund PBS as well as National Public Radio.

With the federal government spending around $5 million a year directly on grant money that goes to Sesame Street, the program remains indelibly attached to public-access television in the eyes of Americans. Overseas, where foreign versions of the show have received funding from the U.S. Agency for International Development—explicitly called out as government waste by President Donald Trump during his address to Congress in early March—Sesame Street has been seen as a particularly effective tool for fostering positive attitudes toward the West.

That deep connection with