“The first day Ma’Kiya Congious wore her Black Lives Matter mask to work, no one seemed to bat an eye. In fact, several customers at the Whataburger location in Fort Worth complimented her on the face covering, which is also emblazoned with a fist. But when the Black 19-year-old returned to work the following Monday, a White customer threatened to call the hamburger chain’s corporate office over the mask, prompting a chain of events that led Congious’s managers to fire her and call the police on their own employee” reports The Washington Post.

“As Whataburger insists it did nothing wrong, the former cashier filed a discrimination complaint Wednesday with Texas state officials, alleging she was let go specifically because of her race and the message on her mask. ‘It’s not a political thing,’ Congious said at a news conference Wednesday. ‘It’s just a statement that says ‘Black Lives Matter’ because we do matter.’ Following a summer of nationwide protests against racial injustice, her incident is the latest in a long string of episodes in which employers have disciplined workers over face masks expressing support for the movement. ‘You’re entitled to your personal opinions, that’s fine. But at Whataburger we don’t want to portray them because some people may be offended,’ one supervisor said, according to a recording captured by Congious. The company ‘doesn’t want to get into anything political because we’re just hamburgers and fries.'”