NATIONAL BRIEFING / WASHINGTON, D.C.

Colin L. Powell, one of the nation’s most prominent African Americans, defended Supreme Court nominee Sonia Sotomayor against those who attack her because of her support for affirmative action.

Powell said Sotomayor should face “a spirited set of hearings” in the Senate. But he said the federal appeals court judge, who would be the first Latino justice, shouldn’t be condemned for ruling against white firefighters who contended they suffered reverse discrimination.

“What we can’t continue to have is to have somebody like a Judge Sotomayor . . . called a racist, a reverse racist, and ‘she ought to withdraw her nomination because we’re mad at her,’ ” Powell said in an interview on CNN’s “State of the Union.”

Powell made clear that he was referring to critics outside the Senate.