It's been a year since comedian Kathy Griffin made headlines for her photo with a bloodied replica of U.S President Donald Trump's decapitated head.
Griffin, on Thursday, opened up about her experience post the controversy in a lengthy Twitter essay.
In a series of 50-plus tweets, the 57-year-old spoke about why it's important that people know Trump didn't 'break' her, "We need to keep track of when Trump goes after people."
"A) One year ago today my Trump photo was released. I have planned on doing this thread for a while but the fact that Sarah Sanders brought my name up at the podium today makes it even more appropriate for me to share some thoughts on what happened. Hope you'll take a look...."
"The image was inspired by Trump's sexist comments to Don Lemon about Megyn Kelly from the 2015 campaign," Griffin wrote. "So the mask photo was meant to be a play on those sexist comments about Megyn. . Did I know the photo would cause controversy? Of course . but I thought it would be a one or two day thing. My point was to do something provocative in an attempt to keep the spotlight shining on his sexism. In my mind that's the role that comics are supposed to play."
While admitting that she knew it would be controversial, Griffin said that she thought it would be a "one or two day thing" that was intended to "speak truth to power" but that after Trump began tweeting about the incident, she was put through the "Trump wood chipper".
"I learned that day the power of the presidency and the power of the Trump machine. Immediately the death threats started pouring in again but more violent and serious than the previous night. The news networks broke into their programming to put his tweet up," she said.
She added, "Was that appropriate use of presidential power? I don't think so," she noted. "It was just plain wrong for the President of the United States to use his power to come after me or anyone else he is offended by. No other president in modern times has used his power this way and that's why I keep speaking out about this. I don't want this to happen to others and while it doesn't always make for uplifting interviews - I'm not going to stop shining a bright light on this.