'Our Dublin' Shirt Prompts Polling Place Brouhaha

DUBLIN, CA — A Dublin polling place volunteer was directed to change out of her "Our Dublin" T-shirt — designed to promote diversity and unity in the community —while working the polls.

While Sima Sadaghiani, a 16-year-old Dublin High School junior, said her fellow poll workers expressed concerns about its content and called the shirt political, a site manager at the polling place said it was an issue of formality, as volunteers were required by Alameda County to don business attire.

Sadaghiani said she showed up to the second day of a four-day volunteering stint at the St. Raymond Church polling site on Sunday and decided to wear a T-shirt that read "Our Dublin" on the front, with fists of varying skin tones. The back of the shirt features a quote from acclaimed book "The Hate U Give" by Angie Thomas: "Your voices matter, your dreams matter, your lives matter. Be the roses that grow in the concrete."

The shirts were designed by Dublin High School's student Diversity Ambassador, Acacia Tripplett, as a means of celebrating diversity in Dublin schools and the broader community.

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"I thought [the T-shirt] was something beautiful and something that resembled unity," she said. "That's what Dublin's community is all about."

Her fellow poll workers, however, told her that the shirt was political and inappropriate attire for the polling place, she said. Sadaghiani was directed to change her shirt or flip it inside out, and she eventually went to her car and brought out a jacket.

The poll workers commented on the raised fists and the repetition of the word "matter" on the back, and said they felt the T-shirt would be controversial, potentially signaling violence, Sadaghiani said. One person who expressed concern told her that Black Lives Matter is political, apparently finding the "Our Dublin" T-shirt reminiscent of the movement, she said.

"I was very appalled by the reaction that the shirt was receiving that day," Sadaghiani said. "I didn't see equality as something that's political."

The problem with the shirt wasn't a matter of politics, said Susan Smith, who was helping to manage operations at the polling place. The issue was that Sadaghiani's outfit had a logo.

She would have been welcome to wear the shirt as a private citizen casting their vote, but the county calls on polling place volunteers interacting with the public to wear business attire, Smith said.

"No one was offended by it," Smith said. "She couldn't wear it at her workplace."

Alameda County could not immediately be reached Thursday to clarify its rules on attire for polling place workers.