Over the last few days, President Trump has faced a lot of controversy due to a photoshopped video he tweeted out this past Sunday. The video depicts President Trump beating up a wrestler with the CNN logo photoshopped onto the wrestler's face with a caption that reads, "#FraudNewsCNN #FNN".

The creator of the video and Reddit user, "HanAssholeSolo" issued an apology calling for peace. While many hoped the statement issued by the author would help calm controversy surrounding Trump's tweet, the apology instead ended up leading to accusations that CNN had blackmailed him into apologizing.

Reddit user deletes account after being depicted as racist

In HanAssholeSolo's apology statement, he expressed feelings of regret and misunderstanding. He felt the media had been portraying a false depiction of him after several news networks ran stories illustrating him as both anti-Semitic and racist based on his previous Reddit posts. The Reddit user then defended himself saying he didn't mean anything by his posts and was simply "trolling" to get a reaction out of people on pro-Trump subreddit "The Donald." HanAssholeSolo, in a hope to bring about peace, chose to delete his Reddit account only to have it lead to more controversy.

CNN accused of blackmailing the Reddit user

By late Wednesday morning, CNNBlackmail was the top trending Twitter topic of the day.

President Trump's army of loyal Twitter followers came out in full force accusing CNN of using "threat" to force HanAssholeSolo to issue a public apology. Trump supporters used an article published by CNN to support their claim. In the article, CNN stated that they wouldn't release HanAssholeSolo's real name because "he is a private citizen who has issued an extensive statement of apology" and he also promised, "[not] to repeat this ugly behavior on social media again." Yet, CNN followed-up their reasoning with a statement that reads they, "reserve the right to publish his identity should any of that change." CNN's caveat statement has prompted ethical questions amongst many Trump supporters, in addition to some across the aisle, about whether it is appropriate for major news outlets to withhold a private citizen's identity under the apparent condition they behave better in the future.

Trump supporters criticize CNN on Twitter

In the aftermath of Han's apology to CNN, many Trump supporters took to Twitter using #CNNBlackmail. As of writing this piece, the top trending tweet on this topic is one created by the Twitter handle, KimDotcom. KimDotcom's tweet included a collection of memes bashing CNN. One meme amongst the collection depicts CNN as if they are taking Reddit hostage at gunpoint.

The tweet currently boasts over 50,000 likes and over 35,000 retweets.

Donald Trump Jr. also chimed in on the controversy via Twitter. He criticized CNN for spending more time investigating a "meme writer" than they did on a number of high-profile scandals during the Obama administration. Senator Ted Cruz went as far as accusing CNN of breaking the law. In a string of tweets issued by Senator Cruz, he accuses CNN of potentially having violated the law had they obtained HanAssholeSolo's IP address and subjected him to "hatred, contempt, or ridicule."
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