People USA – August 12, 2019

and that the government’s response was “unlike

anything they’d ever seen.” Yet she does regret

that she didn’t consider how the photo might

have affected people who lost their loved ones to

terrorist beheadings, like the families of James

Foley and Daniel Pearl. And she has one other

regret, when she thinks about Joyce receiving let-

ters “telling her to go to hell” on the very day she

died: “I felt guilty, like I brought this on,” she says.

“I didn’t mean to, but I still brought this inadver-

tently into their lives at such a difficult time, espe-

cially my sister.” Joyce died in September 2017.

Eventually, Griffin realized she could only

fall back on doing what she has always done

best. “Flick the switch, hit the stage, make them

laugh,” she says. “Nothing makes me feel better,

and hopefully it makes other people feel better. I

just had this gut feeling: It’s back to business. It’s

back to stand-up, no matter what.”

The youngest of five kids raised in Chicago,

Griffin grew up with a work ethic and sense of

humor in her DNA. Both her parents made hilar-

ious appearances on early seasons of her Bravo

reality show My Life on the D-List (her dad, John,

died in 2007) and, having lived through the Depres-

sion, stressed frugality. “My mom would always

say, ‘Use it up, wear it out, make it do,’ ” she says.

Having earned an estimated $75 million in her

career—she lives in a $10.5 million Bel Air mansion

that she bought in cash—Griffin was determined

was like, ‘This will maybe show up on some blog.’ ”

Instead the image went viral—and the response

was swift. Everyone from Fox News anchors to

Chelsea Clinton denounced it, declaring the photo

disgusting and disturbing, with many viewing it as

a threat of violence against the President. Trump

himself tweeted that his son Barron, then 11, had

been upset by the photo. Soon Griffin found her

upcoming tour canceled, endorsement deals lost

and her long-standing gig hosting CNN’s New Year’s

Eve coverage with Anderson Cooper terminated.

Griffin’s mother, Maggie, then 97, called her

daughter, shrieking after watching Fox News:

“They’re saying you went and joined al- Qaeda!”

The federal government opened an investigation

into Griffin; the FBI visited her home. She was

placed on the no-fly list, which forbids people

from boarding aircraft because they pose a poten-

tial security risk. Yet Griffin soon found that she

could barely even leave her house, as death threats

started to arrive—addressed not just to her, but

also to her mother and her sister Joyce, who was in

hospice care for end-stage cancer. “My mom had

an old-timey answering machine—not even voice

mail—and people would leave the most vitriolic

hate,” she says of the recordings she’d race to stop

her mother from hearing. (The investigation was

later closed, with no charges having been filed.)

Griffin makes no apologies for the photo, having

been assured by attorneys that she had broken no

laws and was protected by the First Amendment—

‘I am

American

all the way.

And I am

so grateful

for the

freedoms

I have here’

PEOPLE August 12, 2019 67

Botched Apology

Griffin says the 2017 press conference in which

she attempted to clarify the photo was “a hot mess.

I didn’t know how to handle things.”

Love & Loss
Her sister Joyce,
a schoolteacher
(right, in 2013),
died in 2017.
Her mom,
Maggie, now has
dementia. “It’s
heartbreaking.
You’d never met
anyone quicker
DRESS: BCBG MAX AZRIA; FROM TOP: FREDERICK M. BROWor funnier.”

N/GETTY IMAGES; COURTESY KATHY GRIFFIN