The editor of New York Times' prestigious opinion section has resigned after admitting he didn't even read an op-ed the paper published calling for "an overwhelming show of force" against protesters.
The piece - written by Tom Cotton, a Republican Senator from Arkansas - "fell short of our standards and should not have been published" the Times admitted on Friday, pointing out its "factual inaccuracies" and "needlessly harsh tone".
James Bennet, 54, told staff it shouldn't have been published and apologised on Friday, and resigned Sunday (US time).
The protests which have rocked the US over the past two weeks have been met with an unusually harsh response from the authorities, with hundreds of instances of police violence against civilians and media caught on camera.
US President Donald Trump reportedly had to be talked out of deploying thousands of troops from the country's military to quell the violence he's blamed on "thugs" and loosely-defined left-wing movements such as Antifa.
Bennet's role will be filled temporarily by his former deputy, Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist Katie Kingsbury.
Cotton is a former US Army captain, who served in Afghanistan and Iraq.
