Walmart ordered all of its stores to remove all gun and ammo from floor displays to a secure unseen location om premises, then abruptly did an about face ordering all stores to restock them on their sales floors. This comes after incidents of what the retailer called "civil unrest" in several of its stores earlier this week as "isolated."

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Walmart released this statement earlier today:

"After civil unrest earlier this week resulted in damage to several of our stores, consistent with actions we took over the summer, we asked stores to move firearms and ammunition from the sales floor to a secure location in the back of the store in an abundance of caution," a Walmart spokesperson said by email. "As the current incidents have remained geographically isolated, we have made the decision to begin returning these products to the sales floor today."

 

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This is not the first time Walmart has removed their stock of guns and ammunition from public display. After the George Floyd murder in Minneapolis, Walmart made the same decision to remove weapons and ammo.

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After the deadly mass shooting in an El Paso Walmart the retailer ceased selling ammunition that is used in semi-automatic weapons.  The company also stopped selling assault-style weapons in 2015 and raised the minimum age to buy firearms and ammunition to 21, from 18, in 2018. It stopped selling handguns everywhere but Alaska in 1993, and ended its sales of rifles like the AR-15 in 2015.

During COVID-19, the National Shooting Sports Foundation, an industry trade group, estimates there were a record 12.1 million background checks for gun purchases from January through July, up nearly 72% from 7.1 million gun checks in the year-ago period.

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