Amazon removes shirts with offensive meme referencing Kamala Harris
Outrage over the items began bubbling up earlier this week on social media
{{#rendered}} {{/rendered}}Amazon has confirmed that it will be removing merchandise featuring an offensive meme that makes reference to vice presidential candidate Sen. Kamala Harris.
The meme, which refers to the 2020 Democratic presidential ticket as “Joe and the Hoe,” began to circulate online after Harris was announced as former Vice President Joe Biden’s running mate. Shirts featuring the phrase soon cropped up on Amazon, being peddled by third-party sellers.
The meme, which refers to Senator Harris by an offensive term, began to circulate online after she was announced as former Vice President Joe Biden’s running mate. (AP Photo/Carolyn Kaster)
On Tuesday, the online giant officially removed the merchandise.
{{#rendered}} {{/rendered}}AMAZON INVESTIGATING THIRD-PARTY SELLERS OVER GEORGE FLOYD MERCHANDISE
"All sellers must follow our selling guidelines and those who do not will be subject to action including potential removal of their account," Amazon confirmed in a statement to Fox News. "The products in question have been removed."
Outrage over the items began bubbling up earlier this week on social media, with users urging each other to petition Amazon to remove the items, and in some cases, apologize to Harris. Others claimed they would no longer patronize the site.
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By Wednesday morning, merchandise featuring the phrase no longer appeared to be available on Amazon.
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{{#rendered}} {{/rendered}}Meanwhile, the offensive “Joe and the Hoe” meme has already caused controversy elsewhere in recent days. Bill Baptist, a photographer working as an independent contractor for the NBA, was fired from his position after posting the meme to his Facebook account last week. He later issued an apology, saying he “copied it” from elsewhere on Facebook and that the meme didn’t “reflect his personal views at all.”
“I should not have been so insensitive to post the statements by others,” he added. “I sincerely apologize to all of those who have rightfully been offended and I have taken the post down from my FB page. It was a horrible mistake on my part."
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{{#rendered}} {{/rendered}}Fox News’ Caitlin McFall contributed to this article.