Dublin & Pleasanton Mayoral/City Council Candidate Forum

Salam alaikum everyone. I want to start by thanking everyone for being here today. I know it's uh tough to make it on a Sunday but here you are. Much appreciated. My name is Yahu policy coordinator with care San Francisco Bay Area. I'm joined by my colleagues Nadia Rahman Fatma Juned Hiba Salim and my co-odderator Musat. I want to thank MCC East Bay for hosting us and for Care Action uh for partnering with us on this event. I also want to thank the candidates for taking time once again out of their schedule and I want to thank all of our attendees here today. Um we know it has already been a very exciting election week in this region. There's an old saying in American politics, all politics is local. And I think that's being proven true more and more, especially in the Bay Area. Some of our most impactful leaders began their careers close to home, serving on city councils and working directly with their communities, such as Congresswoman elect Aisha Wahhab, who began her political career on the Hayward City Council, while Melissa Hernandez began here in Dublin City Council. Their journeys are a reminder that local office is often where the path to broader public service begins. And I want to thank you all for being here and recognize your impact in our communities. I also want to start by recognizing the purpose of today's forum. Civic engagement and local leadership matter, particularly in this time in American life. We are living in a time when our rights and democratic institutions are facing serious challenges. While Islamophobia and anti-Muslim hate are on the rise, such as the recent tragedy at the masid in San Diego. In moments like these, we look to our local representatives to stand up for our communities, defend our rights, and make sure that every resident feels heard and represented. That is why your participation in local elections and conversations like this one matters. Next, I'd like to cover the ground rules. Um, first, this is a nonpartisan forum. All candidates in the races represented on stage were invited to participate. We ask that everyone keep the conversation respectful and constructive. We're eager to hear from you and so these ground rules are essential for that. We may not always agree, but tonight is about giving our community an opportunity to hear from the candidates and engage in meaningful dialogue. So without further ado, I'll introduce our esteemed candidates. Beginning with Michael McCoren, who's running for the mayor's office. Sher Hugh also running for the mayor's office. Kieran Muhammad running for mayor's office. Simma Badr, Dublin Unified School District Area 5. Richard Thornberry, City Council District 2. Steve Lurie, City Council District 2. Daniel Har, City Council District 2. Kash Kadri, City Council District 4. As for the Pleasanton candidates, we have Jamie Yei, Council City Council District 3, Reena Gupta, City Council District 3, and Vin Kventi, City Council District 1. Thank you for being here. So, I'd like to start with an little icebreaker. Um we we were hoping to get a little pitch yourself um or elevator pitch. Um so about 30 seconds, tell us who are you, why are you running, and why should voters choose you? And we can start from the left and move onwards. Okay. Hello. Um, hi everybody. My name is Daniel Hall and I'm running for Dublin City Council um, in District 2. Now, I'm a researcher by profession and an active volunteer in our community. Now, I'm running because um, I believe in delivering uh, results. Uh, you need three uh, things. One, you need to listen to the people, you need to u make informed decisions and you need the courage to do the right thing. Um that's the same kind of approach I've been doing in uh my profession for more than a decade and the same kind of values that I hold in my life. Um and with that um I looking forward to uh engaged in discussion. Thank you. >> Go ahead. Good afternoon Mike McCoren and thank you for inviting me here this afternoon. I'm running for mayor because I believe leadership begins with a simple principle and that's putting residents first, listening to them and following through and getting results. Dublin is a wonderfully diverse community and our Muslim residents are an integral part of that. I've had the privilege of working with many of you over the last few years and I value those relationships and I want them to continue and strengthen. I'm here this afternoon to listen and I'm out of time. I'm here to listen. >> Um, good afternoon everyone. I'm Sheri Hu. I'm the mayor of Dublin and I will looking forward to continue to serve as a mayor in the future. I came to the United States as a immigrant and I have a built my life here and built my career and also serving the schools and the communities. Have honor to serve as a city council member and also mayor as a past. Um probably all of you have heard Dublin has been recently ranked the number one best place to live in the state and I'm honored to be the mayor. I want to make sure I continue to serve you uh to make our Dublin continue to be safe place for all of you. >> Should I go ahead? Perfect. Uh so good afternoon everyone. I'm Kashif Kadri. Currently serving as a council member, formerly served as vice mayor. So apologies for the outdated uh name tag here. Uh my three priorities are traffic and safety, thoughtful development, and public safety and well-being. Really excited to share more about that. But I've been serving uh council for four years. Excited to hopefully uh continue serving for another four and uh yeah uh excited for the conversation. >> Uh good afternoon everyone. My name is Sema Ber. I am a Dublin I'm running for the Dublin school board trustee area 5. I'm a parent in the district. I've served as COB's PFC president for two years, vice president at Fallon PFC for three years. I've served chaired the citizen bond oversight committees and um I'm running to bring more student advocacy to partner with our educators, strengthen our schools, make sure our schools are a welcoming place for all of our students. Thank you. >> Hello everyone. I'm Karen Muhammad. I'm running for mayor of Dublin. This is my first time running in any political office, so I'm very brand new here. But what I've done as a neighbor is hear what everyone needs to say. I've built a campaign around that. And what I'm trying to do now is make a human- centered system design approach around that. Meaning there's going to be smart growth and it's going to be part of everyone's advice. Yeah. Good afternoon everyone. My name is Steve Lori. I am the I'm rep running for Dublin City Council District 2. Uh I'm running for city council because I want Dublin to continue to thrive. It is my home. I want it to remain my home and I want it to be a great place. I believe in three things. Connection, collaboration, and community. We can all do those three things. Connect with one another, collaborate for a shared future, and establish community. I think we'll all be better together. >> All right. Hello. Um, thank you again for the opportunity to be here today and to meet with you. Uh, my name is Richard Thornberry and I'm running for Dublin City Council in District 2. And I'm running because I want to make sure we can sustain our high quality of life in Dublin and try to make it a more affordable place to live. Um, I've served the city for almost six years now on the parks community services commission and I look forward to the opportunity to bring some of the things I've learned from there uh to the city council and thank you again for the opportunity and um most importantly just looking forward to listening to you today as well. Thank you. >> Well, hello. I'm Julie Ta and I'm running for Pleasanton mayor. Um, I've had the privilege of serving on our community on our city council for eight years. Um, I had to reduce this down to 30 seconds, right? Um, my record reflects my commitment to human dignity. I, uh, oppose the consideration of ICE detention center in the Tri Valley. I believe local leaders have a responsibility to stand up for due process and fair treatment of immigrant families. I believe diversity makes Pleasanton stronger. And despite our differences, we share the same hopes for safe neighborhoods, strong families, excellent schools, thriving businesses, and responsible growth, and clean water. Thank you. You did it. Do your stats now. Okay. Hi, I'm Reena Gupta, 15year-old resident. Um, a 15-year resident, mom of two PUSD grads, a local business owner, built and successfully exited companies, served our community in many roles, including economic vitality committee, passionate about youth and workforce development, and founded Mom Relaunch Foundation. Most importantly, I believe democracy thrives when residents are informed, engaged, and heard. I'm already listening to residents bringing their voices to city hall, engaging our youth, and I am running to bring your voice to the table where decisions are made. Asalamu alaikum. My name is Vin Kurventi. I'm a first generation immigrant, businessman, and a community advocate running to make sure we give Pleasanton what it really deserves. We don't want our kids to not have the quality of life that we enjoy right now. It's a beautiful place to live and uh I feel my business experience scaling large companies and also through my nonprofit uh I can help out a lot. Thank you. >> Hi everybody. I'm Jamie Ye and I'm running for Pleasanton City Council District 3 also. and my parents moved here in 1969. So, it's been a very long time that I have lived here. I am a daughter and and granddaughter of to immigrants. Um I do work in the Alama County Health um which is a public organization and I've learned a lot working in the public space as well as serving as a Pleasanton Unified School District trustee for 12 years. So, I bring a lot of experience working with communities, government, and um and I'm hoping today that I can learn more about you and you can learn more about me. Thank you. >> Thank you everyone. I've got to learn a little bit more about you and today we'll be moving on to the care questions. >> Okay. Great. When you have 12 candidates on stage, you have to keep an eye on all the mics. Um, so we're going to be moving on to the Q uh the questions that we have for you today. I do want to remind the candidates that we are sticking to a strict 90-second limit for the answers. Um, because of the wonderful turnout on stage that we see here today, uh, we want to be mindful of that. So for the first question, anti-Muslim hate has reached a fever pitch with 2024 and 2025 marking the highest levels of anti-Muslim violence and discrimination reported in CAR's 30-year history. Given this alarming trend, what specific steps would you take to ensure Muslims feel safe, heard, and represented in your city? Start with you. All right. Um, thank you for the question. So, the first thing I want to say and is that nobody deserves hate um because of their identity or where they came from or the color of their skin or their faith. Now, um the proactive steps that we can take to uh stop hate before they occur and some of the things u even things that we can advocate at the local level. So for example, we can strengthen um collaboration between uh the police and um schools, places of worship and affected groups. But really what I want to say to this is that there's one thing that all of us can do um and that's leading by example um to normalize denouncing hate. So saying something is not okay is um shows solidarity to and commit solidarity to affected peoples and commitment to our values. So when somebody asks um you know leaders about say a topic of like Gaza um Iran, Lebanon um they they might even know local leaders don't have the uh the authority or they're limited to what they can do. But what people want is empathy and they want to know that their leader has their back. Um, and they want to see and hear moral courage and leadership from their leaders, local leaders included, to do the right thing. And I don't think that's too much to ask. I think I'm going to get it in 90 seconds this time. So, uh, look, all residents of Dublin, all residents of the region, um, are welcome. They're welcome in our city. uh uh they need to be respected and safe in our feel safe in our city and that's that includes Muslims or anybody else. Uh what I would do and not just because this is a political time is I would open up dialogue with the families with community letter leaders with with mosques listen to their concerns and and act upon them. Um I would also advocate for uh uh crossfaith um uh relationships trying to understand the the needs of the community. Um and as far as the police are concerned uh it's important that they focus on uh hate crimes and bias uh incidents and making sure that they they are absolutely important. I want to make sure that people know that Dublin's diversity is one of our strengths. My commitment is simple. I will listen. I will engage. And I will stand against hate and discrimination in all forms. There you go. >> Good job. Thank you. So, um, as a mayor, I want to make sure any form of hate and discrimination is deeply concerning to me. And, um, every Dublin resident, whatever their faith, their culture, their background, and they deserve to feel safe, respected, and heard, and included. So, I also connect with this topic from my personal experience. I am the first generation immigrant. I came to this country when I was 26 and so I understand how important to feel you belong to this country. You belong to this community and also local government see you as a part of the community members. So for me there's a three parts involved in this safety voice and the belonging. So safety means we will take all the threats, discrimination or hate incidents seriously and people can call me, call the police and call the staff and we'll take that seriously. And second thing is about voice is a conversation. It's about dialogue. We want to build relationships before a crisis happens. I'm not stranger to this MCCA place and we always open door to the community leaders and the community members. And uh third thing is about belonging. We want to make sure our community members voice is heard. So I just want to keep here. Thank you. >> So first of all I wanted to take a moment to thank the organizers for putting this on. I also want to thank the attendees for for coming out and uh also all the candidates that bravely accepted uh to come on this candidate forum. It it it means a lot. So um obviously there's no place for xenophobia, Islamophobia, any form of hate. Uh I stand strongly against all of that. Uh in answering your corre uh your question directly, uh I kind of see it as four things. So number one is I always try to be an active listener, try to connect with folks and stay accessible. I think that's number one. uh because if you don't know what's going on then you don't think that there's a problem. Uh number two is awareness uh community engagement and community celebrations and I think those all go hand inand if you start to understand and kind of lean into it you'll discover things that you may not have known and that then only can you build those uh establish those relationships to hear about the problems as well. Uh the third is education about rights, about resources, about support and focus on education. Uh because if folks don't know that their rights are being vi violated or what to do about it, they have nowhere to turn. Uh and that's a partnership. And the fourth thing that I'll mention is maintaining a good positive relationship with police and and uh law enforcement, local enforcement. uh if the police officers are not friendly to communities, if they haven't gone to through sensitivity training or like bias training, they're going to treat folks differently and they want folks to feel we want our community members to feel welcome and uh our law enforcement to be approachable. Uh and I'll leave it at that. Thank you. Um so um like you know everyone has mentioned um I strongly believe that there's no space for hate any kind of xenophobia or you know that every person in the community regardless of their faith has the right to feel safe and heard and that includes Muslims and this is especially important to me as a parent of a Muslim student in the Wified school district. Um what I would do as a trustee is make sure that bias reporting is real. Um families need to know how to report an incident if something happens. Um you know and how that follow up should happen if something like that should happen. Um we need to be building relationships before you know we reach these kind of crisis situations. I've spent years building that trust within the communities through interfaith communities um through my work through PFC's through the different um you know commissions in the in the district. Um, I want to make sure that we have a strong staff training and make sure that our staff are um, you know, trained on how to deal with Islamophobic and bullying and religious accommodations needs. Um, make sure that our students have a voice and including cultural and faith-based student clubs so kids have a place to be seen and heard. Um, to show up consistently and not just when there's a headline. Um, representation means that Muslims families see a trustee who always who already knows their names, not one who discovers them during a crisis. Thank you. >> I'd like to thank the city for making August the Muslim awareness month and I will also say that I stand by our civil liberty 69-3 resolution. People shouldn't have to become a victim before city decides their voices matter. So, I'm going to break that down into four pieces. First, we're going to meet. We will establish regular meetings between city leadership, Dublin police station services, faith leaders, and co uh community organizers, and not wait until after it happens. Second, we're going to report. Again, we're going to make sure residents have a clear and accessible way to report hate and bias and know what happens after it's been reported. Number three, we're going to train. We're going to push for hate crime, cultural awareness, and bias training with Public Safety Services of Dublin who they contract with. And lastly, we will appoint, we are going to encourage qualified residents to apply to communities who haven't traditionally had a voice at city hall and apply for civic leadership positions. Ultimately, my goal as a mayor is that Muslims, residents, and other interfaith residents don't have to meet their mayor for the first time after an incident happens. >> Once again, thank you all for allowing me the opportunity to be here. Uh there is no place for hate anywhere in Dublin or anywhere else. Uh no person should ever feel unsafe for being who they are. It's absolutely un unconscionable and it's our responsibility as civic leaders to ensure that that doesn't happen. The opposite of hate is curiosity. As I mentioned in my uh intro statement that connection is critical. I think every opportunity we have to bring people together to create individual connection makes all the difference in combating hate. When you look at children on the playground, they don't understand hate. That's a learned that's a learned trait over time. And I think if we engage the community and allow each other to get to get to know one another, we won't have nearly the issues we have. The second piece is to collaborate. Uh no community here wants to be the victim of any type of hate. And so we share the same problem. And so we should be able to collaborate towards a solution. And by doing so, us all come together. We create the community that community that we can all be proud of. Thank you very much. Um, so I think there's three parts of the the question I wanted to address. You mentioned how to keep safe, um, how to listen or how to be heard and how to represent. And so first for listening, it's just engaging with the community, coming to things like this, taking the opportunity to actually learn, um, have thoughtful discussions with people. Uh, as far as keeping safe, um, you know, I we have to use our voices to call out hate when we see it, have zero tolerance for that, be leaders, model good behavior on that, um, uh, ensure that our law enforcement is taking, uh, issues around hate crime seriously. Um, and even just in, you know, non-law enforcement situations like in schools and things like that. Um, encouraging people to do that. Uh, and then finally in representation. So, you know, you can listen and you can try to keep people safe and that's one way to represent people, but I think we also have an obligation to celebrate the community in a way that's I love the the comment that was said over here is not just to talk about these communities when something has happened, when someone has become a victim, to talk about them in a positive light. And so by that I I mean um you know continuing to to celebrate cultural events, cultural days, things like that. um celebrating local small businesses that are a part of these communities as well and really uh represent in a positive light and show all of the beautiful diversity that um people bring to the community. So, thank you. >> Well, earlier I mentioned that I've um I'm on the record as opposing the ICE detention center. In doing so, um it sends a message for that human dignity and fair treatment to all is important. Um, I I think it's um it was a divided conversation on my city council and that was disappointing because I firmly believe that we have a responsibility to set that tone for our community and to come together as a tri valley and um make our position for human rights and um fair treatment for everyone known. Um, I will also say I'm very proud of the role that I've played in Pleasanton. When we're asked for specifics, um, I was a, um, I was instrumental in the development of a alternative response unit which um, pairs clinicians with our officers and it has made such a difference in our department. We have such a culture of compassion that wasn't there prior because of the understanding that the CLI clinicians now bring. I'm very proud of my role in that. So, um I think I'm out of time. Thank you. >> Okay. Hate in any form is unacceptable. Period. But let's not just talk about how we respond to hate. Let's talk about how we prevent it. First, being heard. That's the heart of my campaign. That's why I've created this magnetic civic access card. Just scan the QR code, give a little room on your refrigerator. Anytime, anywhere. I listen, I'm already carrying this voice. So, this is a system that belongs to you. This is how you get heard. Let's not wait for crisis to happen. Second is belonging and representation. Pleasanton is a multicultural town. I would like to propose celebrating Eid in downtown just like we have that and I'm ready to plan as well. I will do it for sei and eid hugs. Okay, that's that's my motivation. Uh second is being represented at the committees and the tables where decisions are being made. Most importantly, we need to start early. When kids are mocked in the schools just in the name of a joke, that is when it the real problem starts. So we need to start and tell them it's not okay. So and if it happens our law officials and police everybody needs to take actions very strongly. So prevention is better than cure. Let's start preventing when it happens. Use your voice. Use your se access card. Use it to make your voice count. attack on one community is an attack on the entire fabric that holds our cities together. And I want to thank uh care. Being a Hindu American, I've experienced it myself. And CARE was one of the organizations that came out and condemned the temple vandalisms in Newark, San Diego, and the shootings in uh Utah. Being somebody who grew up with Muslims, a Muslim is my best friend like and that's how I grew up and I will stand up for the community and one of the things I would do as your council member is foster communication right from the beginning not when something happens but even before with mosques, community leaders, the police department and everyone and also um make reporting accessible hate crime reporting and ensure that victims understand what services are available, right? And we should also evaluate security needs around important uh uh uh occasions uh around like mass and place of workship and um when credible threats arise, the city should respond quickly and visibly. Thank you. >> You said 90 seconds. Okay. Um, unfortunately I have lived experience with racism and Asian hate myself over the years. Um, and it's just doesn't feel good for anybody and it's very it's just I don't even have words for it. But in my day job working for the Alama County Health Systems or Alama County Health, we have training already in place for all of our staff about um how do we reduce racism and hate when it comes into our county buildings. As a school board member, I was actively part of making sure that there were policies and things in place and getting educational programs going so that we did kids would learn and staff would learn and we did not want to have any um unconscious biases happening in the school district. Been working on those things for years and years. Unfortunately, you know, it still is something we always have to keep on top of. Um you know, we I always just still think, are we still having this conversation? It's just so sad. But we just need to do more, step up more and be more firm about things. I will say that um during COVID in the health agency, we wanted to make sure that everybody was heard and seen in the effort to make sure people got vaccinated and we actually this background reminded me um I worked with one of your board members during COVID and we had a really nice video that was posted so that people in the community could see themselves in the advocacy work around COVID. So really appreciated that partnership. Thank you. >> Now moving on to the second question. As federal immigration enforcement expands, many communities are concerned about local cooperation with ICE and its impacts on immigrant families. If elected, would you support strengthening local ordinances that limit cooperation with ICE? And what steps would you take to protect immigrant communities while complying with state law? All right. Uh, thank you for the question. So, uh, this question for me is an easy yes and I hope it's an easy yes for everyone uh, up here. Um, simply put, ICE is not welcome here. Um, already and the great thing about this is that we already have legal frameworks and examples that we can follow to do this. So um as many of us know there's the California Values Act or SB54 um and that provides legal frameworks for um that limit uh cooperation between California civil staff and uh federal uh agencies uh like ICE. Um so uh there are also examples of other Californian cities like um Long Beach or LA or Oakland or Berkeley who have um taken steps to reinforce or uh further limit whatever uh SB54 already covers. Um now for example we I if say we're collecting immigration uh status data and we don't need to do that we can just simply close that loophole and not collect that data. Um other things we can do are like uh uh perhaps uh clarifying procedures for city staff on what they can do in uh in case they encounter uh situations that could put immigrant families at risk. So re to reiterate, ICE totally supports strengthening local ordinances uh against cooperation with um ICE. To me, it's not a situation of yes or no. It's a matter of what can we do and how do we do it? For me, this is uh two-pronged. One, as a resident, as a citizen of the United States, um I think it's incumbent upon me to to uh protest, to show my to show my dis uh pleasure over all this. So I I have been out there with groups protesting this from a public official standpoint. However, um we need to look at things in a different way and the same way. Uh I also reference SP uh 54. It it's very restrictive and it gives us something. The fact that it's there doesn't mean as much as enforcement. Um, I think what we need to do is make sure as uh local officials that we are actually enforcing this at the local level. And that's what I would do as as a mayor to make sure that that they are actually being followed. Um, and I would do one more thing is that I would look at our current policies to make sure that they're current and clear and following along with the law. Um, I would also uh like to point out that we look at it from the the public from the uh police standpoint. The fact that they aren't allowed to use a lot of resources for um for these uh national issues with with the with the government is is great, but we need to also make sure that they are focused on uh following the law and treating people with the dignity. and uh the the important point of all this is to make sure that our residents feel comfortable with with uh the police. So I'll hand it off for that. >> Thank you very much. Um so this is a very very important topic for us especially for our city of Dublin. Um so as immigrant myself I already shared that um background myself. So I understand this immigration enforcement can create a fear and uncertainty for the families especially in our such a diverse community uh here in Tri Valley and in our city specifically. So people should be able to call the police and report a crime, attend a ci city meeting and ask a local government for help without being afraid that their information or their interaction with the local government may um pro pose a threat to their family and double police services is provided by Alama County Sheriff's Office and um this uh organization ation operates under current um California law which already established policies governing the civil immigration um enforcement so we know we are in a safe state, safe place. So my priority as a mayor is always uh make sure our local public safety resources focus on keeping the doubling safe and also re remain a very warm and trust relationship with our residents and uh um our business um over there as well. >> Right. So, I'm going to preface what I say by uh mentioning that both of my parents were uh were not born in the states. I was uh first generation here born in in the States and and so when we talk about immigration, we talk about ICE, it it it hits home. Um you know, this country was built by immigrants. Uh and there's no place for mass bandits and vigilantes to go running around uh doing doing what they're doing. um in order to directly answer your question. So, number one, yes, I would absolutely strengthen local ordinances that limit uh cooperation with ICE and and other fed federal agencies that target immigrants. Uh number two, I support immigrants in learning uh their their rights and protections and uh making those resources available if they do come across uh an ICE agent, for instance, what they are allowed to and what they don't have to share. I think that's really important. Uh Dublin is roughly 60% Asian-American. There's a huge number of immigrants living in Dublin. And so this I'm extremely sensitive to this, not just personally, but for our community's well-being as well. Uh the the third thing that I'll mention is that when it came around to an ICE proposed ice facility in Dublin, I was very outright and publicly spoke out against this. Um I took it a step further within our mission, visions, and values. I advocated for protections around the health, safety, and well-being of all Dublin residents regardless of their immigration status. I will point out that was a 3-2 vote and you can look at the record there. Um, and I've spoken out about this publicly. Thank you. >> Um, thank you. So um I you know I have been very vocal in my community about um how I feel about ICE and ICE has no place in Dublin. Um when the FCI Dublin was to be used as a um ICE um you know detention center I was very vocal with our local communities including Indivisible Tri Valley and I spoke out against um you know any kind of ICE you know detention center within our community and um you know I've I've held I've spoken at many vigils. I've raised my voice against this and what I would do as a school board trustee is make sure that first and foremost is one of my priorities making sure that students feel warm, safe and welcome and that nobody can you know just come into our schools and you know violate any kind of you know laws by by like you know coming in as ICE. um you know there has to be those kind of limitations on you know do they have a warrant what what can they do and what can't they do and this the the schools the district all needs to know like you know what what's allowed and what's not and I think it's very important as well to um make sure that front office staff are trained that our school staffs are trained um and then just in general to be a voice for the community thank you >> first off I'd like to thank Dublin for supporting being against that ICE detention center. Thank you. Appreciate that. My answer to this is that I stand by and remain committed to the SB54. Number one, policy. We're going to ask for review of Dublin's existing policy and agreements involving immigration enforcement and determine what additional protections are legally available. Number two, as far as data goes, I want transparency about when and under what circumstances Dublin's contracted law enforcement services interact with federal immigration authorities. Number three, for services, I want to make it clear that residents should be able to access ordinary city services regardless of immigration status where the law allows. And number four, building trust. I'll work with immigration organizations and Dublin police services so that residents understand what local police do and what they don't do with immigration enforcement. If there is an additional law for protection for Dublin residents that can prepare local resources from being used for civil immigration enforcement, I would support bringing that before the city council. I also want to appreciate that we have now been able to see the kinds of crime rates in our city. We've seen that domestic violence is quite high in im immigration community. I would rather that they come forward to the police for that. >> Thank you. I support any measure that would limit the federal government's uh enforcement of immigration policies locally. There's no scenario where any individual should ever be allowed to wear a mask while performing the duties as part of their public service. You can't be a public servant and hide behind a mask. If you're doing what you're supposed to be doing and doing it properly, doing with respect and dignity, you have nothing to fear. As a member of the executive team on Camp Parks, I was actively opposed to ICE operating within the military community, and I took that responsibility very seriously. the the larger issue with uh ICE and the national attention they've gotten besides being a horrific organization and being completely inappropriate to our families is that it erodess the public trust between citizens, our immigrant community, and those that are sworn to protect and serve them. And so I would never want someone to be victim to anything and have them feel like they can't go to the person whose sole responsibility is to address their concerns for fear of their immigration status or how they might be perceived or how they might be um addressed. And so I support the abolishment of of ICE uh locally and it's it's no question in my mind. Thank you very much. Uh to answer the question directly, yes, I would support strengthening ordinances ordinances as applicable to limit cooperation with immigration enforcement um actions. Uh I'm really proud that this state and our local police officers with the Alama County Sheriff's Department um are not cooperating in uh immigration enforcement actions. I'm really proud that our city uh stood up and did a uh supported a resolution saying we do not want the FC FCI Dublin facility to become an ICE uh detention facility and that we don't want that in our community. We don't want ICE operating in our community um in a way that's really just terrorizing our residents, terrorizing immigrants, terrorizing people who are not immigrants, people who just are different than them. Um and so I I don't support um any cooperation uh with that effort at all. Um you know, I think the final thing that the city can do is continue to share resources and information about rights and how um people can keep themselves safe and protect themselves. Um you know, and I think it's one thing to kind of put the information out there uh one time, but there's a lot of people who uh you know, don't necessarily know what the city's up to or what government's up to. And so I think it really takes a sustained effort on our part to continue repetitively to share the information um and make sure we get it out and connect with people where they are, where they see it, and where we can help inform them about it. And so um really being proactive about that is something I think we can be doing. Thank you. >> Okay. Well, I've already um made my position pretty clear on this one and I've been very public with it and um in doing so, I mean it's important that we all understand as we do immigration policy is a federal um issue, but the values we uphold locally are our choice and we should be outspoken. Unfortunately, this issue isn't as easy a yes as it should be. My city council, our current mayor, wouldn't allow even a discussion about um taking a position to oppose um the ICE detention center. So, um it it was a 3-2 vote. Me and one colleague repeatedly we bring it back every council meeting asking for support on the council to have the conversation and and send the message because while we don't have that authority it's important also our um city slash PD made a statement early on about how and I I I I our current um police chief is amazing and she made the statement that um the PD's role is not to support ICE and that all people should feel safe to report crimes and understand that that isn't a role that our department will play. >> Well, there is a clear boundary between federal responsibility and local public safety. Immigration enforcement is primarily a federal responsibility. Our local police and city resources should remain focused on keeping our community safe. And yes, I would support lawful local protections that limit our city's involvement in civil immigration enforcements while complying with state and federal law. This is also personal to me. I lived in Pleasanton for 15 years, raised my family, built businesses, created jobs, helped women return back to the workforce, and served this community in many different ways. Yet during this campaign, while knocking on doors, I have still been told, "Go back to your country." I have had my loyalty questioned, my ident identity questioned. That experience reminds me how important trust and belonging are. If someone witnesses a crime or is a victim of a crime, they should feel safe coming to Pleasanton Police for help. Residents should also know exactly what our city will and will not do. That means clear policies, properly trained staff, and reliable know your rights, information, and legal resources. We can uphold the law while maintaining trust in local law enforcement. We can, and we should do both. >> I support ensuring that Pleasants policies provide immigrant families the fullest protection permitted under state and federal law. Our local police officers should be focused on preventing crime, responding to emergencies, and protecting residents, not functioning as uh federalized agents. When immigrants are afraid to report domestic violence, fraud, or other crimes because they fear an immigration consequence, everyone becomes less safe. And California's value act already limits the use of local resources for federal immigration uh enforcement. And as a council member, I would ensure that Pleasanton follows these protections faithfully, transparently, and consistently. Thank you. >> Hi everyone again. Um so my experience in the community is that the fear is real. Um, we actually have students that will disappear for weeks on time because they've heard ICS is around and they go into hiding. I've also had experience working in communities in the county where um a kid would come up to staff and say, and I just wish I could unhear this, if they take my parents, can I come live with you? Um, I know that I checked recently to make sure that all of our libraries did have a supply of the red cards and the resource um, information that the county is providing to all of our public libraries. Um, I checked to make sure that we have a supply. Um, I checked on Dublin and Pleasant and I didn't check on Liverour. Um, and that we do have this training in the county that helps people understand what you can do if something is happening. And I would really like to look into um how we can expand that training to more um people in our communities. I think that'd be very helpful and and and something very relevant and we can all be a part of. And on a side note, I do think that we all need to really organize and make sure that when the time comes, we can change out our uh federal leadership. Um thank you. >> Thank you everyone for our third and final question. The genocide in Gaza, now in its third year, remains a deeply important issue. Many in our for many in our community. Last year, California enacted AB715, raising concerns among educators, students, civil rights organizations, and community leaders that discussions about Palestine and other global justice issues in schools could be chilled. As a city and educational leader or educational leader, how would you use your voice and position to support students and educators ability to engage in respectful fact-based discussions on these issues while also ensuring students are protected from discrimination and harassment? >> Right. Thank you for the question. So first I want to acknowledge that um you know genocide in Gaza uh is real. It causes a lot of uh pain and anger to many people from different um backgrounds and communities myself included. Um and uh to to see that the attempts to apparently stop discussion even fact-based discussion on a topic like this that can be pretty distressing. So now I also want to point out that AB715 um involves the public school system. So that uh that's under the purview of the school boards. So that brings about um certain realistic um uh limitations to what city council can do now. But what we can do in city council is to show solidarity um uh with our community and to show commitment to basic principles like uh like our first amendment rights. Um, for example, city council can uh city council members can easily speak out using the weight of their office on protecting first amendment rights um and encourage discussion on a fact-based uh basis. The city council can even uh issue resolutions supporting specific stance um uh if some if communities come under um attack. Now, what we can realistically do will probably depend on uh the issue at case and how we cooperate with the school board. So, yes, I've been around for a long time and uh during the civil rights movement and Vietnam War, I was a little kid, but I knew what was going on. This is somewhat of a replay. uh what we've talked about here is is uh something that's deep to all of us and affects all of us personally. Um but as pointed out there are limitations of what we can do. Uh we don't set the curriculum but we can be the voice of advocacy. The mayor can be the voice of advocacy to pull uh pull together people for for constructive dialogue. And uh you know it's it's got to reflect. It's got to be respectful. it it's got to be open to to to perspectives, different perspectives. Um, but we're we're here to advocate for peaceful, wellthought uh discussions because in the end, quite frankly, it it's we want to make our environment safe for this this types of complex issues should absolutely be discussed in our in our schools and we should never ever be limited uh to this. uh this is something that's deep for me too. So I will leave it with with that. I yield my time. >> Good job. Yeah. So thanks for the question and I believe all the students and the teachers they should be able to to learn and then um discuss and also um they should be able to receive the accurate information and express their concerns no matter their background, no matter their uh faith and the culture and different skins they have. and they should be free from the discrimination uh intimidation and harassment. And myself as an immigrant, I deeply understand how disconcerning this can be and how u heavily this topic to families um and cultures and communities. And I just want to say as you already heard about as a mayor, as a city uh leader, we do not uh set curriculums. Um, but we do want to um we do want to make sure our students, our community members are safe and we do want to hear their voices and we do want to make sure they can have a civic dialogue without discrimination and the diversity make our city successful and stronger and I believe in um a safe safe community. Thank you. Right. So, um, first of all, fundamentally want to protect free speech. Uh, certainly shouldn't legislate, uh, away our free speech and and the rights there. Um, and and I think it's important to also underscore, you know, anything shy of violent or threatening speech should be protected. Uh, even if you don't disagree, even if you uh whether you agree or disagree, uh, excuse me. Um, you know, I think diversity of perspectives is important and that actually makes our community stronger. Um, I've been a a strong advocate for peaceful protest. Uh, encourage that. And I also highly encourage folks to come out to our city council member city council meetings for public comment. Uh, and and and that's a great way to share your thoughts and perspectives on on issues that are important to to the residents. Uh, as was previously mentioned, uh, DUSD, the Dublin School District, is separate from the city. Uh, but personally, I feel we should be sticking to fact-based curriculum. uh curricular that veers away from politics as much as possible. Uh we should also uh encourage students or uh ensure students uh be allowed to know what's happening in our world without fear of being discriminated uh or or any sort of uh intimidation or or bullying. >> So um thank you for the question. Um um first I want to mention that um I have been a strong advocate against AB715. I've been at our capital. I've been talking to our current congressional leaders when it was up. It was firmly against AB715. Um as a trustee um I would make sure to protect um the difference between bias and inquiry. I would um you know a student asking a fact or you know a fact-based question about Gaza or a teacher facilitating respectful decision is not the same thing as targeting you know um a classmate for for who they are from. Um our board and our administration need to be clear about that distinction. Um giving educators real support is not um a compliance memo. If state is going to hold teachers to a new standard, the district owes them the clear guidance and training on how to handle these conversations well. Um we need to enforce anti-discrimination, anti-harassment um protections evenly. So you know a Muslim, Arab, Palestinian, Jewish student, all are protected and none of them feels that their identity is being um threatened. Um we need to keep listening to the community directly as a DSD trustee um to hear from our Muslim, Arab, Palestinian and Jewish families and educators as this law is actually implemented. Um, but you know, free speech and, you know, standing up for yourself should never be um, you know, something that we're discriminated against and um, and I I'd hold um, you know, the the school um, you know, curriculum accountable for that. Thank you. Hello everyone. Again, thank you so much for saying that you would support building a resolution like we would as the Alama sister cities have to put a ceasefire in Gaza. I would like to say yes, the double mayor does not control the Dublin unified curriculum, but that doesn't mean a mayor is powerless. So, I'm going to break this down into four pieces. One, convene. I can bring students, educators, parents, multiffaith communities, and community letter leaders together where there is a issue that creates tension locally. Number two, I'm going to listen. I would make sure that Palestinian, Arab, Muslim, Jewish students, and families all have the ability to tell community leaders what they're experiencing. Number three, I would speak. If legitimate issues of Palestine is being treated as inherently helpful, I will support it. But if there is a Jewish student that's experiencing anti-semitism, I would also step in and say that's wrong. Number four, protect. I'll use a mayor platform to defend the principle that political speech and discrimination are not the same thing. I don't want Dublin to come in and say that as far as we are subject to silence, we cannot talk about political policies. As long as it doesn't cross the discriminatory line, you're able to have free speech on campus. And I want to protect our students. >> Thank you. I just want to I want to state that uh war and the act of war in any in any manner is is atrocious and unconscionable to to human rights and hum and humans in general. As someone who is as a young young man spent time in both Iraq and Afghanistan, I've I've seen uh the consequences of war and and you will not find a greater advocate against it uh than me uh in public office or me in the privacy of my own home. Uh obviously I support fact-based curriculum in schools, but we have to acknowledge that uh the history's always been written by the victor. And so there's a responsibility where we can come together and reconsider what we what we call those facts. Acknowledging that uh the city council and the the the Dublin mayor can't uh necessarily affect the uh curriculum itself. What we can do is establish opportunities and forums to bring community leaders together, faith leaders together, parents together to have the earnest discussion so that we can educate our children in our homes after schools. We can identify those that are well spoken on those issues and invite them into the classrooms to share their experience to help young people understand what's actually occurring. Nobody nobody deserves hate. Nobody deserves genocide. Uh these are these are basic human rights. Um and I expect every member who's a public servant to uh be a champion for that cause. Thank you. >> Um so yeah, I do think we should stand up and protect people's uh free speech rights and you you can do that without tolerating hate speech or speech that is uh threatening in other ways. So I think those are are are two different things. Um, and then, you know, when it comes to having, you know, restricting people having fact-based discussions, like I don't think that that is something that we should be doing. We should engage people in the discussion. We should have fact-based conversations about what's going on in the world, particularly when we're talking about, you know, educating younger people. Um, the goal here is to help teach them how to have respectful, difficult conversations, how to become critical thinkers. That's a big part of education as well. And so I think if you try to muzzle or avoid those types of conversations, you're not really improving the situation and you're not teaching people how to um engage in the real world that they're about to be going out into. So, um, like folks have said, I think there's, uh, limited capabilities what the city council can can do, uh, you know, in terms of setting education policy, but we can try to engage in those fact-based conversations ourselves and teach people by example how to have, uh, respectful conversations about very difficult issues. Thank you. >> Well, I certainly agree with a lot of comments that have been made. Um, I think leading by example is important and but we are limited on the city council. That isn't our role. That really is our school district's role. But what I do see an opportunity for is to um have a discussion with our youth commission. I would like to know what their thoughts are. I'd like to know what their experiences are. I'd like to know what they think we could do to support them in having these discussions. So, um I will be going um to our youth commission and trying to get some feedback from them. I that would be my starting point. So, the human suffering and loss of life is not acceptable and it is heartbreaking and so are the concerns about anti-semitism. AB715 purpose was to prevent discriminatory instruction and protect students from bias. I believe implementation should be even-handed, factual, age appropriate discussions about Gaza, Palestine, Israel, and other current events belong in our schools. The answer is not to stop difficult conversations. It is to teach our young people how to have them. I would support professional development so educators have the tools to facilitate these discussions with fact context and with respect and this connects directly to what I'm already doing. I have youth champions throughout I have been a youth champion for entrepreneurship workforce development and now civic engagement. Young people are already researching real issues, writing articles and publishing through our platform. You can check the article on our website. some publications already. I welcome them to use the platform for difficult issues like this. Research it, write it, read another perspective and respectfully agree to disagree. Education should teach our young people how to think, not what to think. Protect the student, protect the conversation. Thank you. There is a personal opinion here and what's in my control. I cannot control what start in schools but I'll tell you what my opinion is this SB714 is uh against the principles of first amendment that's what I strongly feel we should be able to have meaningful conversations without the threats of violence or are being discriminated based on how you look or what your background is or what your religious beliefs are. And being a father of two girls, I feel that my kids should not fear for who they are. And I would strongly stand for every single kid irrespective of what their background is and what their religious identity is and what their beliefs are completely right. And and I strongly stand by it. And um one of the fundamentals of the schools should be to teach our kids to be critical thinkers and not silence their voices with these like nonsense uh laws. Sorry to say that. And also uh one of the things that we all have to think is this first amendment and there are people really uh violating the first amendment or taking advantage of it by burning religious books and those are hate crimes. >> Okay. So, I was a schoolboard member for 12 years and I've been in lots of classrooms and have watched our teachers teach and I will say that most of them are very balanced in their approach. They're very well trained and I don't think that this law came about because of anything happening in our particular district. Um, so I don't want any teachers to feel that, you know, we're thinking they're not doing anything right and that's why this bill happened. But unfortunately, this is a law that is now enacted and it has unintended consequences in my opinion and I've have a lot of experience in this of working through the legislative process. There's ways that you can amend law current laws um or change them or get rid of them. And so this does it was actually kind of shocking to me to see what the voting record was on this bill. So, I think there is some strategy here to work with legislators to get this bill amended. Um, I if you're not going to stand for something because you don't think it's right, let's get the law changed. It's not necessarily that what's happening in the classroom isn't um appropriate at this point in my time, in my experience. So, I'd be happy to um help bring those conversations together with legislators and strategize and lift up and see what we can actually do to get this law changed so that it works for all and not just for one certain group because we need to have intellectual freedom and safety for all kids in all of our classrooms. Thank you. >> Thank you everyone. That concludes the questions that we have. Prior to going to the audience Q&A, uh, I'd like to give a moment for everyone's closing statements. So, I ask that you keep it to one minute. Um, and we'll begin on the side. >> All right. Um, first off, uh, thank you to, uh, Care, MCC, East Bay, and everyone present. I thought it was pretty interesting and, uh, to hear everybody's perspectives on the questions. Um but for me my my takeaway from this is that the um forum highlights the my some of the key messages in my uh campaign which is number one the need to listen to people uh the need to make informed decisions and having the courage to do what is right. So now I'm I'm I'm just an ordinary person like I'm just a regular person trying to do good for my community and for my help fellow human being. Um I don't have all the answers and I think that's okay because my door is open and we can rely on each other to cooperate and communicate as a community. Um and then we can find solutions that work for us. Now, I'll invite all of you to find out more about me and my campaign at my website at uh danielhaw.com. That's pretty easy. That's my name.com. Um and uh I look forward to engaging with all of you um on the open floor. Thank you. >> Thank you again for the opportunity uh this afternoon to share why I'm running for uh double mayor. Uh for me the campaign comes down to one fundamental goal and that's to preserve and uh the the enha and enhance the quality of life of our city and our residents. It means putting residents first, listening to their concerns and following through and delivering results. And sometimes we have to think outside of the box to get those results. Dublin's a diverse community. Uh I believe uh the diversity is um uh one of our greatest strengths and as mayor I want every resident to feel safe, respected, heard and included in our community and in our government. Um I appreciate the opportunity to be here with you uh and to listen to all of all of you folks here and to con uh continue building relationships with the Muslim community as well as other communities in in our region. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you for having us here and thanks for the audience for your active uh actively listening and have a meaningful discussion over here on different very important topics. So as a current mayor of Dublin, a proud mayor for the beautiful city of Dublin, which is a diverse U community and we have been able to provide safety and protection to our community members and I just want to make sure we keep doing the good job and keep provide this um safety and also provide this uh active conversation with with the committee members and keep providing um public services in great um in great level to our residents and we just want to make sure everybody feel they belong and their voice matters and also our local government is here um accessible to each one of you. >> So first of all appreciate the dialogue uh but let's remember this is today is the start. Let's continue these conversations. Let's continue to connect and and engage. Um, as some of you know, I'm really into coffee. So, if anytime you want to have a cup of coffee, I'm happy to have a have that set that up and and really learn from each other. Um, you know, Dublin is a great city. We were just named the number one city uh living best city to live in uh by the US world uh and news report in California. Uh, but there's a lot of areas that we can improve. uh whether it's thoughtful development, whether it's traffic and safety, whether it's public safety and well-being, there there are things that we can do to improve. Um so I encourage everyone to uh you know, let's go further together. Uh you know, I've been I've had the honor for serving on council for the last four, looking forward to the next four. Uh if you're interested in learning more, please visit my website kashifthe4dublin.com. Thank you. Uh once again, thank you so much to CARS SFBA, Care Action, MCC East Bay for holding this forum and inviting us all today. Um I look forward to if elected to serving as your DSD trustee in area 5. Um as someone who's been very actively involved in our um you know, schools as a parent, as you know, serving on our um you know, committees in the district, um I feel very um at home with the district. Um I have a good relationship with um our students, our faculty, our staff, our administration and um I think I would um really be honored to serve as your trustee. Um my priorities are simple to advocate for our students first and foremost to partner with our educators, make sure that they have what they need to support our students and to make sure that our su our schools are um amazing facilities that welcome each and every student warmly. Thank you. Thank you everyone. I appreciate care and I appreciate MCC for supporting me along this journey. I also want to thank members in the audience who have been with me along the way. I deeply appreciate you guys. And the reason why I'm saying this, this is my first time. I have no previous history of running in political office ever. And the person that inspired me to get here is Daniel. Daniel came knocking at my door. He said he was running for district 2 council. And I was like, "Oh, how can I help you? Oh, I run in district two. can't go run against you. So I of course I asked Marsha Moore I said how can I help Daniel? She says why don't you run for the city mayor? I said okay let's do it. So then I built a website. I asked Daniel, did you build a website? He said no. I was like all right. I guess I'm going to have to start getting this ball on the road. Maybe I'll help Daniel out next. But then I got a great deal of help from members in our audience. Reena, thank you so much. She's always been next to me as well. Turog, my partner, Christopher McCoy. He's been my campaign manager and he's also been my voice of reason to make sure I keep going along on this journey. If you need to see what I'm about, go to my website, karen4dublin.com. >> Uh thanks again to uh Care for hosting the event and and MCC East. Thank you for being a a place of faith that that welcomes the the share the sharing of ideas uh the concept that that we we have differences but we can celebrate those differences and and we can come together uh and establish a greater community. Uh this has been a really exciting experience for me. I've also never been a part of something like this. Um and you know I look forward to the continued dialogue. I'd like to be on the other side of this where I could sit and listen more and talk less because I have a lot to learn. I'll never I'll never advocate as myself as the smartest person in the room, but I will always listen and uh try to engage in meaningful dialogue. Just ask everyone to to lead every interaction you have with kindness and be a good human. >> Uh I want to say thank you again to Cara for the invitation to participate today to participate today. Uh thank you to the audience for listening to us, the fellow panelists uh for the discussion and I look forward to continuing to have more discussions with you all in the future. Um, my wife and I have called Dublin home since 2019. And we're really proud to be raising our young son in a community that's safe, diverse, and really familyfriendly. Um, since 2021, I've served on the city's parks and community services commission, which is an advisory body to the uh, city staff and city council. And I'm running for city council now because I want to make sure that we sustain our high quality of life in Dublin and uh, help strive to make it a more affordable place to live. So, to do that, I think there's three things we should be prioritizing. uh fiscal sustainability, public safety, and uh housing affordability. Um if we focus on those things together, I think we can uh maintain a high quality of life for Dublin today and for generations to come. And I'd like to thank you again for the time to meet with you. And if you'd like to learn more about me, you can visit my website at richardthe4dublin.com. So thank you again. >> I too would like to say thank you for bringing us together for this discussion. It has been a discussion far different from so many of the um forums that we have and will attend. So um I think it's been really productive. It's been good for me to um be pushed to think about some perspectives that aren't the average. I I normally would be talking about um safe and clean drinking water and um quality of life. Muslim families are important part of Pleasanton. You're our neighbors, our friends, and part of the fabric of our community. As mayor, I want every resident to feel welcome, respected, and heard. That means standing firmly for principles that should never be political. Equal treatment, freedom, um dignity, respect, and the right to participate fully in our community. I'm running to represent all residents of Pleasanton and make sure everyone has a a voice at the table. Thank you for welcoming us today. >> So yeah, thank you to Cara and MCC for having us. Um when I started my campaign, my first question was do you guys know what's happening in the city hall? And the most interesting answer I got is what is a city hall? So my thing was like how do I bring that civic disengagement? And that's where I built the system. Again, I'm going to show you this. This is the heart of my campaign. And when Kieran said I'm helping, I think what now we have become a group of people who are and I'm their tech support. So, anybody who wants who anybody who wants a system where they want their residents to come and talk to them, my platform is open. It can be customized. It can be and by the time we build this civic engagement, we also streamline lot of background and back back office things. So, yes, I'm a city council. I'm a tech support. I'm an active listener and if you remember anything even one thing that you want to remember about me just remember I'm standing up for you. Your voice this is my responsibility. It's a commitment beyond city council seat. This is a movement that we have started and I will commit that it will continue beyond the election. >> Thank you K. Thank you MCC. It's an honor uh to be here. I thank everyone who's here spending uh their Sunday here rather than uh doing something better. It means a lot. Pleasanton is a special place and we are at a crossroads historically. We've kicked the can or the councils kick the can down the drain and it is the problem. It is the problem of this council to solve structural deficit. If we don't, we'll be a Stockton, we'll be a Vallejo. In my fight, I bring in a unique skill set to the table. I have helped over 40 nonprofits turn around and also uh uh small businesses turn around scaled like global companies. And this council needs that kind of skill set and we have to do it now to make sure our kids still have Pleasanton as a home. Thank you for your time. >> Yes, thank you. Thank you all the way around for me as well. Um, anybody who followed me on school board for 12 years will know that I was the one who would always ask the really hard questions. So, I really appreciate your questions because I think what questions do or what these questions did was it just made me search deeper into my heart and my values to help me articulate how I really feel about the particular questions that you asked. So, thank you for those questions. Um, I think that giving some thought to these questions helps to deepen my advocacy and my leadership in my role as a city council member. Um I will bring my 12 years of public um engagement experience on school board and also as a public sector um employee for the almost 20 years and I would be honored to have your support and I want to continue either way this partnership and this discussion. It's very much important to me. Thank you >> so much to everyone who attended today to all our elected officials and all of our candidates for joining us in the community today. We're living in a time where Muslims are being attacked in an unprecedented way. There is there are demagogues at the highest levels of government who are trying to erase Muslims from civic life. So, we really appreciate all of you coming here today and ensuring that our voices continue to be represented in the process and for giving all of us a chance to hear from you and what you will do for not only the Muslim community, but the larger community here in Dublin in Pleasanton. Um, as we close the program, I just want to let folks know who are here in attendance today. You'll have a chance to ask any questions and discuss concerns with our elect elected officials and our candidates today as the program wraps. And I appreciate each and every one of you for being here today. This is a domino effect for each person that shows up today to hear from their candidates and their elected officials and they take that to the ballots and they take that to when they vote. That is how change is made. With each vote is a cascading effect, a domino effect where change is made. So we appreciate each and every one of you in the audience for being here today. And once again, thank you so much to all of our candidates for being here today with the community. Thank you so much.