Attorney and former San Francisco supervisor Angela Alioto could be ousted from her seat on the San Francisco Democratic County Central Committee following condemnation of her repeated use of a racist epithet at a public meeting last month.

Alioto used the word “n—” six times at the DCCC’s April 24 meeting following a presentation on racial discrimination within city government.

The meeting was a forum for African American members of the SEIU 1021 union to highlight racism, retaliation and long-standing pay inequity they’ve endured while working for the city and to demand action on the part of local, state and federal officials.

Alioto, a civil rights attorney, used the word in an effort to underscore the corrosive, traumatic effects it can have in the workplace, referencing previous racial discrimination cases she handled. She urged the SEIU workers to press their own cases in court, using the word to illustrate that its mere utterance in the workplace creates a hostile work environment.

In a video of the meeting, attendees appeared clearly disturbed by Alioto’s repeated use of the word, despite her attempt to contextualize it to illustrate its ugliness. Several audience members implored her to stop saying the word.

After Alioto finished her remarks, DCCC Chairman David Campos said he thought the use of it, regardless of context, was inappropriate.

“You can say ‘the n-word’ without saying the word, because I think words matter,” he said during the meeting.

Phelicia Jones, an SEIU 1021 member who gave the presentation to the DCCC, is urging the committee to remove Alioto. Jones works in the San Francisco Sheriff’s Office.

“If, in fact, you’re a civil rights attorney, you should know better — regardless of the context,” Jones said. “You know what this word means and what it has done to our race and what it continues to do to black people.”

The San Francisco DCCC, the governing arm of the Democratic Party in the city, will discuss the incident at its May 22 meeting. Alioto’s remarks were first reported by the San Francisco Examiner.

“It’s tone-deafness,” Campos said in an interview Monday. “From what I gather from her comments, she was trying to be empathetic in some way, but I think that empathy got lost and completely usurped by the actual use of the word.”

Campos said the committee would decide how to move forward. There is a process in its bylaws for removing members following a formal hearing and a two-thirds vote of the committee’s 33 members.

Alioto said Monday that her own attorneys dispute that reading of the bylaws and she doubts she can be removed.

“I personally don’t know what the right answer is. I think something has to be done that, at a minimum, underscores that that kind of language is not acceptable at the DCCC, that the use of a racial epithet — no matter the context in which it was used — is not appropriate and that we do not condone that,” Campos said.

“I went too far, and I am profusely sorry that I offended anybody,” Alioto said Monday. “I get passionate, no question. I was in a teaching zone. I started giving examples of that word in my other cases to show everyone in the room that (discrimination) is pervasive in San Francisco government. But I feel so horribly that any person, especially any African American woman, was offended.”

She also defended her rationale for using the epithet.

“My clients say the word. ‘The n-word’ doesn’t mean anything. You do not sugarcoat or whitewash that word when you’re in litigation mode.”

Twanda Bailey also attended the April 24 DCCC meeting to share her own story with the committee. Bailey sued the San Francisco district attorney’s office in 2015, claiming that a co-worker used a racial slur and that she was subjected to a hostile working environment after she raised concerns. A judge ruled in the city’s favor in 2017, but Bailey and her attorney are appealing.

Bailey said she was subjected to daily harassment before she left the office.

“I suffered physically, mentally and financially,” she said. “I wasn’t offended by (Alioto) using that word at all. I’m offended by how the city and county treated me and handled the situation after I was called a n—.”

DCCC member Sophie Maxwell wasn’t present at the April 24 meeting, but was aware of the incident. Maxwell, who is black, has not called on Alioto to step down, preferring to let the committee’s process unfold before making up her mind.

“I just think (saying the word) is something you don’t do, especially with other African Americans there telling you how offensive it was to them,” Maxwell said. “With all of that, it’s reasonable to think that it was not the best thing for her to do or say.”

Dominic Fracassa is a San Francisco Chronicle staff writer. Email: dfracassa@sfchronicle.com Twitter: @dominicfracassa