Many thanks for featuring Portland’s new and first Somali police officer, Zahra Abu, in your lead editorial Jan. 15 (“Our View: Somali police officer takes on positive role in Portland”).

I’ve known Zahra for over four years. She was a work-study student at Sullivan Gymnasium at the University of Southern Maine, where I am a member.

Those of us who met Zahra then knew immediately that she was going to succeed in life. At age 18, she was mature, dependable, hardworking and goal-oriented. She was a hit with us older members because she took an interest in our lives and shared hers. She was and is a delightful person.

Her family immigrated to Portland not knowing our language and with very few reserves. Now, years later, she and all her siblings have college degrees and are contributing in important ways to American society.

I know a number of other students at USM who have come from Africa and the Near East. They too want to succeed and contribute, as do millions of other immigrants who have come from Europe, Asia and other parts of the world. Knowing them has enriched my life.

It is crucial now, with the hateful demagoguery of the likes of Donald Trump, that good people stand together and resist the base impulses of people who hate and fear those whose race and religion differ from theirs.

Leonard Pitts spoke eloquently of this in a recent column (“Trump isn’t Hitler, but his dangerous ideas could tear apart our country,” Jan. 13).

He writes: “To read of how fascism stole over Germany is to repeatedly ask yourself how an enlightened nation could have fallen for such transparent garbage. Well, the answer is unfolding before us in real time, and it ought to horrify good people into taking a stand.”

Barbara Doughty

Portland

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