Walmart Yanks ‘Rope. Tree. Journalist.’ T-Shirt From Inventory

Given the tenor of far-right conservatives’ characterization of the media, it’s no surprise that T-shirts that seemed to suggest journalists should be lynched and hung made their way to the world’s largest retailer’s website. Walmart has since pulled the shirts, listed through third-party seller Teespring, after a journalist advocacy group complained that the shirts were threatening.

The message on the shirts reads: “Rope. Tree. Journalist. SOME ASSEMBLY REQUIRED.” They’re not a new product, and showed up on the backs of supporters of President Donald Trump during 2016 election season campaign rallies.

The complaint about the T-shirts was lodged by the Radio Television Digital News Association, whose Voice of America First Amendment Task Force sent a letter to Walmart’s top executives Tuesday and asked that the T-shirt be removed from the retail giant’s online inventory.

The group’s executive director, Dan Shelley, said the shirts could “at the least … simply inflame the passions of those who either don’t like, or don’t understand, the news media. At worst, they openly encourage violence targeting journalists.”

“We believe they are particularly inflammatory within the context of today’s vitriolic political and ideological environment,” Shelley wrote, pointing out in his letter that nearly three dozen journalists have been physically assaulted so far this year across the country “merely for performing their Constitutionally-guaranteed duty to seek and report the truth.”

“We recognize that under the First Amendment, companies have a right to sell, and consumers have a right to purchase, these shirts,” Shelley said. “But that doesn’t mean it’s the right thing to do, especially in today’s vitriolic climate.”

The statistics on attacks on journalists were gathered by the U.S. Press Freedom Tracker, which the RTDNA helped establish. The organization’s press freedom advocacy group, the Committee to Protect Journalists, says that at least 48 journalists worldwide have been killed so far this year.

Walmart said the T-shirt design “clearly violates our policy” and were removed “as soon as it was brought to our attention.” The company said it is conducting a thorough review of the Teespring's assortment of T-shirts.

Teespring, which allows people to post shirt designs, confirmed that the shirt has been pulled and said it is working to prevent such content from slipping through its filters, The Associated Press reported.

"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," Teespring said.

In August, Teespring pulled a “rainbow swastika” T-shirt from its own site, promising at the time to more closely monitor its product line.

In a statement on the RTDNA website, Shelley said the group is “grateful for Walmart’s swift action” to remove the T-shirt, “but dismayed that it, and anyone else selling the shirt, would offer such an offensive and inflammatory product.”

Teespring competitor Zazzle removed the T.-shirt from its inventory last year. The decision came after the T-shirt was spotted in Minnesota at the rally for Trump.

The Associated Press contributed to this report.

AP Photo/Tony Gutierrez, File