American news network CNN has defended the professional courtroom artist it engaged as part of its coverage of Donald Trump’s appearance in New York this week to face charges linked to alleged irregularities in his 2016 campaign spending.

The unnamed graphic artist drew criticism from Trump supporters online for the photo-realistic sketch published by CNN to accompany its stories about the ex-President’s court appearance. (main picture)

CNN has often been a favourite target of Trump who has rarely missed an opportunity to single out the network and its coverage of him as “fake news”.

A CNN spokesperson said the unnamed graphic artist had produced a “standard representation of Mr Trump, albeit their own artistic interpretation”.

“We feel it compares favourably to the illustrations used by other media outlets in their coverage of Mr Trump in the New York City court which have included pictures such as a Getty Images photo or a more traditional courtroom artist sketch such as the New York Times used,” the spokesperson said. (below)

“As a global news organisation CNN always strives for accuracy both in our reporting of the news and in how we illustrate it.

“We believe we achieved that with our coverage of the New York court appearance by the former President.

“It called for a graphic element that best illustrated the event. The alternative would have been for us to use the stock image we developed of Mr Trump. (below)

“But we felt in this instance that something more specific to the actual event was needed,” the spokesperson said.