On the ground at the Sesame Street public media protest

NPR Headquarters Washington DC

The Sesame Street crew appeared at NPR headquarters to support a “Protect My Public Media” rally to protest President Donald Trump, Congress and the FCC yesterday.

Big Bird, Elmo and Count von Count stood behind those who gave their prepared addresses. Around them stood nearly two dozen protesters carrying signs in support of NPR and PBS. One woman to the left of Elmo waved a banner that read, “No one voted for Elon Musk,” which she likely recycled from a previous protest.

The rally was run by Protect My Public Media, an action network that aims to “protect the federal investment in public media.”

Craig Aaron of the Free Press spoke first. He said that if “multibillionaires in this country paid their fair share, we’d have plenty of money for public media and real local journalism.” He said that only then could thousands of journalists be on the streets “uncovering corruption and painting a true picture of our incredibly diverse communities.”

It appears that Aaron wants Jeff Bezos to pay not only for the Washington Post, but for NPR as well, without allowing him creative control over either. “We can have all this if Bezos would stop destroying the Washington Post and pay his own taxes,” he said.

Aaron also brought up the investigations being launched into NPR and PBS by the recently appointed chairman of the Federal Communications Commission, Brendan Carr — or, as he referred to him, “Brendan Carr, the censorship czar.”

Carr is using the FCC’s Enforcement Bureau to investigate these taxpayer-funded entities for possibly breaking federal law, as it “prohibits any NCE station from running commercial advertisements.”

In a letter addressed to the presidents of PBS and NPR informing them of the investigation, Carr mentioned Congress’s current consideration of defunding these institutions. He added his own thoughts, saying, “I do not see a reason why Congress should continue sending taxpayer dollars to NPR and PBS given the changes in the media marketplace since the passage of the Public Broadcasting Act of 1967.”

A senior policy counsel at the ACLU, Jenna Leventoff, responded to this claim at the rally, saying, “His own desire to see these entities lose funding is not grounds for agency investigations.”

Leventoff continued by addressing the First Amendment. She said the First Amendment “says the government cannot interfere with the media’s decision on what to publish, or what not to publish.” Although this could apply to controversies like the AP being banned from certain parts of the White House, it’s an interesting argument to make at a rally in support of government funding for a news agency.

The rally lasted no longer than thirty minutes. When it was finished, a proportionally large group of those in attendance began chanting “Fuck Robert Mercer” before a DJ started playing the Sesame Street theme song as the crowd started to disperse.

Many counter-media groups began interacting with the speakers, attendees and even the Muppets, leading to heated exchanges. In one such interaction, a female protester was using her “Protect Press Freedom” sign to block a camera. When asked if she saw the irony in that, she said that she was exercising her First Amendment right to block media she disagreed with — which seemed to contradict the message of the rally.