Safiya Khalid is no stranger to facing challenges head-on.
As a seven-year-old, Ms Khalid fled war-torn Somalia with her mother and two younger brothers.
Arriving in America, she didn't speak the language and knew virtually no one in her unfamiliar but surroundings.
Ms Khalid and her family settled in New Jersey before making the move to Maine, drawn in by Lewiston's affordable housing, quality education and low crime.
Today, Ms Khalid said the city's population is approximately one-third Somali.
More than a decade after calling the United States home, Ms Khalid decided to campaign for public office, spending six months knocking on doors up and down the streets of her hometown.
Despite a sense of optimism and hope, the young Democrat was rocked when a wave of online abuse began swarming in on social media.
"I just couldn't take it," Ms Khalid told The Washington Post.
"I was crying so bad. My eyes were completely red."
Amplifying her anxiety was the fact that someone had posted the political aspirant's home address on social media.
Opting to press ahead with her campaign, Ms Khalid deleted her Facebook page and asked friends to look out for any worrying comments.
After returning to the street to continue her grassroots campaign, Ms Khalid secured her place in history by becoming the region's first Somali-American city councillor.
At 23, Khalid is quite possibly the youngest official to ever serve on the Lewiston City Council. Her victory is one in a number of landmark local election achievements.
In the state of Virginia, Muslim women were elected to the senate and the Fairfax County School Board for the first time in history. Nadia Mohamad, 23, became the first Muslim woman and first Somali to be elected to the St Louis Park, Minnesota city council.
Chol Majok,34, who fled violence in South Sudan, became the first refugee to be elected to public office in Syracuse, New York.
