Just months after the uproar over it selling an item labeled "n*gger-brown," Walmart again found itself in hot water for selling a controversial item on its website.

According to The Hill, a t-shirt sold by third party seller Teespring appeared on Walmart's website displaying the words, “Rope. Tree. Journalist. Some assembly required," which would seem to advocate for the lynching of journalists.

Photo: GIPHY

Apparently, the shirt became popular after it had a brief moment of infamy following its appearance at a Trump rally in Minnesota right before the 2016 election.

The Radio Television Digital News Association (RTDNA) sent a letter to Walmart, urging them to take it down.

“As a fierce proponent of the First Amendment that is politically nonpartisan, we recognize Walmart’s right to sell the t-shirts, and the right of consumers to purchase and wear them,” wrote RTDNA executive director Dan Shelley. “However, just because Walmart has the right to sell the shirts, that doesn’t mean it is the right thing to do.”

Within hours of receiving the letter, Walmart removed the t-shirt from their site. “We have forwarded this to the appropriate team to remove it. Walmart.com does appreciate feedback like this so that offensive material does not appear on our website," Walmart's Executive Escalations department sent back to RTDNA.

According to the Inquierer, the retail giant followed that letter up with a statement which read, "As soon as we were alerted to this content promoting violence against journalists we removed the content, added this content to our automated scanning systems, and kicked off a human sweep of the site to find and remove any similar content."

As was the case with the cap labelled "n*gger-brown," the company also said the shirt "clearly violates our policy."

Walmart said it slipped through the cracks because "this item was sold by a third-party seller on our marketplace," and promised to conduct "a thorough review of the seller's assortment."

"We are grateful for Walmart's swift action, but dismayed that it, and anyone else selling the shirt, would offer such an offensive and inflammatory product,” Shelley said in response to the apology. “We live in an environment in which political and ideological discourse has deteriorated to the level where some find it appropriate to advocate violence targeting journalists merely for performing their Constitutionally-guaranteed duty to seek and report the truth."

Radio Television Digital News Association

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