Donald Trump castigated a well-known comedian on Wednesday after the release of a grisly-looking photo showing her holding up a prop depicting the president’s bloodied severed head.
Kathy Griffin had apologized earlier for the picture — released on Tuesday by the celebrity photographer Tyler Shields — following a wave of criticism from many quarters, saying in a video posted on Instagram that “I beg for your forgiveness” for having “crossed a line.”
“Kathy Griffin should be ashamed of herself,” Trump tweeted. “My children, especially my 11 year old son, Barron, are having a hard time with this. Sick!”
Griffin, an outspoken Trump critic who won two Emmy awards for her reality show “My Life on the D List,” had said she would ask Shields to remove the image from the internet.
Among those tweeting in reaction to it was Trump’s son Donald Trump, Jr. “Disgusting but not surprising,” he said. “This is the left today. They consider this acceptable.”
Chelsea Clinton — the daughter of Trump’s former election rival Hillary — also weighed in, calling the picture “vile and wrong.”
“It is never funny to joke about killing a president,” she said.
CNN anchor Anderson Cooper, who co-hosts a New Year’s Eve program with Griffin on the network, tweeted that he was “appalled by the photo shoot.”
“It is clearly disgusting and completely inappropriate,” he added.
CNN called the picture “disgusting and offensive” in a statement, adding that that it is “evaluating our New Year’s coverage.”
The Secret Service said it would investigate, posting on Twitter that “threats made against @SecretService protectees receive the highest priority of all of our investigations.”
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