Donald Trump Was Depicted as a Total Garbage Muppet On Sesame Street

By Aimée Lutkin | March 21, 2017 | 3:25pm

In Depth

Donald Trump’s proposed budget will defund PBS and anything else that gives the U.S. even the thinest veneer of intellectual curiosity. However, Sesame Street may still survive on HBO, which is good, because they really know how to drag the president.

The Washington Post found the three episodes of the classic long-running children series that mock Trump’s real estate ventures via his attempts to divide the loving residents of Sesame Street. In his first two appearances, he’s given the moniker “Ronald Grump,” but in the most recent, from 2005, he’s plain ole Donald Grump and wearing an orange toupee, a guy “whose name equals trash.” Wow, take ‘em to school, Sesame Street!

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The very first episode featuring Ronald Grump came out a few years after Trump Towers opened in New York City, according to the Washington Post, so resentment levels over his shady dealings were high. Oscar the Grouch is talked into signing away his trashcan so Grump can build a “can-dominium” high rise. Oscar is given a spot and three bags of trash in the deal, only to find out he can’t keep his pets, Slimy and Fluffy. Grump demands 40 bags of trash to give up his trash can duplexes, which Oscar’s neighbors help him collect.

But Grump returned in 1994, for the show’s 25th anniversary special, threatening to tear down the whole block to create a new “Grump Tower.”

Big Bird leads a protest (great free costume idea for your next march), but what saves them all in the end is the fact that Oscar’s can is owned by the government, so he can’t be forced out. They didn’t know that Trump would eventually own the government too.

The Washington Post suggests that Trump may have some long simmering resentment towards PBS because of their puppet-based lampooning, leading to the imminent threat of being shut down. But there’s no evidence that he’s ever mentioned—or tweeted— about the show. There’s also nothing to suggest Trump’s ever watched an educational program in his life.