I've stopped recommending Python for learning programming, and instead have started recommending Go.

Python's environment difficulties make it exponentially harder for beginners to focus on actual programming concepts. Things like pyenv or virtualenvs or any of those things are blackboxes to beginners.

Go is simple, it's tightly coupled to version control so you can teach git at the same time in a meaningful way, and it's low level enough that CS concepts come up frequently, while being powerful enough that it will scale with a beginner's knowledge.