Nabeela Syed, 23, got here of age throughout the Trump administration. An Indian Muslim American who wears a hijab, she remembers the previous president’s 2016 Election Day with good readability. She was a a senior at her highschool in Palatine, Illinois, and the racist, Islamophobic rhetoric being parroted round her sealed her first political reminiscence. 

“The day Trump got elected, I remember I cried in every single one of my classes,” she advised NBC News. “I felt like this country was not for us. I was like, ‘I don’t know if I belong here.’ This is the only home I’ve ever known, and I was questioning whether or not I belonged here.”

Six years later, in November 2022, one other election has come to imply one thing completely completely different for Syed. 

This 12 months, her title was on the poll to characterize the Illinois General Assembly, and he or she gained. In doing so, Syed flipped the Republican-held 51st District, wherein she was born and raised. In January, she’s going to turn out to be the youngest member of the meeting. 

“It’s important for me — growing up in this community and knowing what it feels like to not belong — to make sure everyone feels like they do belong,” she stated. “It’s a big moment for my family personally, and I hope it feels to other young people and to women of color that we can do this. We have space here.”

Her victory has led to an outpouring of help from all around the globe, and the information has gone viral on social media for the reason that election. 

“You broke the glass ceiling to pieces,” stated one Indian American on Twitter.

Syed’s dad and mom moved to Palatine from Hyderabad, India, within the Nineteen Eighties. They got here right here in search of extra alternatives, she stated, and to ascertain a household wherein their children may thrive. 

“I’m very grateful for all the sacrifices they made so that I could live here,” she stated. “Never in their wildest dreams did they think that I would run for political office. And here I am running for office and winning, and it’s because of them…My mother said if I didn’t do it, who would?”

Her dad and mom weren’t silent supporters both, she stated. They have been on the marketing campaign path, canvassing neighborhoods and spreading their delight and perception of their daughter. 

“There were people that came up to me on Election Day, and they were like, ‘You look like your dad, he was knocking on doors in my neighborhood,’” she stated. “We saw people that were lifelong Republicans, and my dad showed up at their doorstep…Seeing him there made them decide to vote for me.” 

Word about her win reached Indian information retailers, in addition to U.S. ones, and Syed stated her grandmother specifically was touched by the strides she’d made. 

“My grandma was straight up sobbing,” Syed stated. “She grew up in a completely different era, a completely different environment and culture. To see so many people support someone that looks like me was very very exciting and emotional for her.”

Spending time together with her grandmother has instilled a deeply rooted look after her neighborhood in Syed, she stated, and he or she’s proud a era of South Asian girls who lacked the help to pursue their goals can watch that change.

“They’re the ones who have done so much so that I could be here today,” she stated. “They’ve taken care of us.” 

Like many Generation Zers, Syed grew up watching “Wizards of Waverly Place” and the Cartoon Network and fangirling over One Direction together with her buddies. She remembers when Twitter and Facebook turned common in center college, after which when Instagram blew up in highschool, however she by no means anticipated that inside a decade, she’d be utilizing these retailers to attach together with her constituents. 

After knocking on doorways, Syed stated she would ask neighborhood members to take a selfie together with her on the marketing campaign path. Her social media accounts are full of those selfies, thanking the voters who spoke to her by title. 

“That is what is necessary to make politics more palatable, to make campaigns more palatable and to make sure that we’re doing the work to listen to voters,” she stated. 

She campaigned on a platform of reproductive justice, gun reform and reasonably priced well being care, making prescriptions extra reasonably priced for those who want them. Social media helped her broadcast her messages louder than she may have hoped, she stated. She’s now talking to an viewers of 1000’s, lots of whom are different younger South Asians who wish to her as a frontrunner of their era. 

“Your peers may not have looked like you, your culture is different, the food you bring to lunch, it might look different and smell different, your holidays are different,” she stated. “I’m only 23, but I’ve grown a lot more comfortable in my identity. I’m honored to be a young South Asian.” 

Her youth and the truth that she’s not far faraway from her childhood permits her to acknowledge younger voters’ experiences as her personal, she stated, and he or she’s working towards constructing an Illinois that makes area for everybody. 

“This is just one story,” she stated. “There are so many other young South Asian folks that are doing incredible things. Whether it’s politics, comedy, social media, medicine, it’s incredible to see how powerful this demographic is.”