causing users to suggest that Reddit admins are interfering with their art (there is no evidence so far that would prove this)

If you watch the time lapse, you’ll see that the guillotine was wiped away in an instant, which would either require mass coordination or admin privileges. There’s also the fact that it was removed in chunks, not pixel-by-pixel. Also, it was proven last year that one of the mods didn’t have a cooldown.

Reddit has been thrown into chaos because the company began charging for access to its API

No, it’s because they began charging an amount that isn’t affordable to third-party app developers and with very little notice. They also lied about being willing to work with developers and they made false allegations against Apollo’s developer.