Sen. Jeff Flake speech: Trump 'charting a very dangerous path' with media attacks

Sen. Jeff Flake on Wednesday issued a passionate defense of "truth" while defending the American media from President Donald Trump's sustained attacks on its integrity as "fake news."

In a major floor speech, Flake, R-Arizona, urged his Senate colleagues to act as a check on Trump and unite "to turn back these attacks, to right these wrongs, repair this damage, restore reverence for our institutions, and prevent further moral vandalism.”

"No politician will ever get to tell us what the truth is and is not," Flake said. "And anyone who presumes to try to attack or manipulate the press for his own purposes should be made to realize his mistake and to be held to account."

Flake continued: "An American president who cannot take criticism, who must constantly deflect and distort and distract, who must find someone else to blame, is charting a very dangerous path."

A Congress that does nothing adds to the danger, he said.

READ:Flake's speech: 'No politician will ever get to tell us what the truth is and is not'

The speech warned of the real consequences of Trump's anti-media rhetoric. Flake noted that 80 journalists were killed last year and cited a report that said 262 journalists are jailed around the world. That number includes 21 who faced "false news" charges, he said.

"Those of us who travel overseas, especially to war zones and other troubled areas all around the globe, encounter members of U.S.-based media who risk their lives, and sometimes lose their lives, reporting on the truth," Flake said. "To dismiss their work as 'fake news' is an affront to their commitment and their sacrifice."

Trump is not only borrowing "despotic language" about the press, but he's also further inspiring "dictators and authoritarians" with his words," Flake said.

"This is reprehensible."

Trump had teased 'fake news' awards

Flake's speech was timed to coincide with Trump's anticipated announcement of "fake news" awards, which Trump had tweeted would spotlight "Dishonesty & Bad Reporting in various categories from the Fake News Media." But it was unclear this week whether that would happen; White House Press Secretary Sarah Sanders referred to the so-called awards as a "potential event."

"It beggars belief that an American president would engage in such a spectacle," Flake said. "But here we are."

In his speech, Flake looked back on 2017 as a year in which "objective, empirical, evidence-based truth" was "more battered and abused than any other in the history of our country, at the hands of the most powerful figure in our government."

"It was a year which saw the White House enshrine 'alternative facts' into the American lexicon, as justification for what used to be simply called old-fashioned falsehoods," he said.

"It was the year in which an unrelenting daily assault on the constitutionally-protected free press was launched by that same White House, an assault that is as unprecedented as it is unwarranted. 'The enemy of the people' was how the president of the United States called the free press in 2017."

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The truth must take a stand in 2018, he said.

Sarah Sanders, the White House press secretary, later voiced umbrage at Flake's suggestion that Trump's anti-media words are inspiring dictators to crack down on the press.

Sanders slammed Flake over his long-time advocacy for liberalizing U.S.-Cuba policy, saying Flake recently visited Cuba "and served as a mouthpiece for the oppressive Cuban government."

"He's not criticizing the president because he's against oppression. He's criticizing the president because he has terrible poll numbers," Sanders said. "And he is, I think, looking for some attention. I think it's unfortunate."

Sanders added that the White House welcomes the media and takes journalists' questions every day "and to act as if we're anything but open to the back-and-forth exchange is utterly ridiculous."

Flake sharpens tone on Trump

Flake, who announced Oct. 24 that he was abandoning his 2018 re-election bid, took some heat over the weekend from conservatives on social media after an excerpt of his speech revealed that he intended to point out that Trump had called the media "the enemy of the people," a phrase that historically had been deployed by Soviet dictator Joseph Stalin.

Flake has been a critic of Trump's tone and tenor since the 2016 presidential election, during which Flake neither endorsed nor voted for his party's nominee. Trump supporters have criticized Flake as bitter and having a vendetta against the president.

MORE:Is Sen. Jeff Flake thinking about challenging Trump in 2020?

On Monday, Flake clarified that he wasn't comparing Trump and Stalin, who was infamous for executing political enemies or imprisoning them in forced-labor camps.

"I am in no way comparing President Trump to Joseph Stalin," Flake told CNN International's Christiane Amanpour. "Joseph Stalin was a killer. Our president is not. But it just puzzles me as to why you'd use a phrase that is so loaded and that has such deeper meaning, the press being the enemy of the people."

In his Wednesday speech, Flake said: "This alone should be a source of great shame for us in this body, especially for those of us in the president’s party. For they are shameful, repulsive statements. And, of course, the president has it precisely backward. Despotism is the enemy of the people. The free press is the despot's enemy, which makes the free press the guardian of democracy."

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When a figure in power calls the press "fake news," that person should be the target of suspicion, not the media, Flake said.

Criticism from the right continued even after Flake's clarification of the Trump-Stalin comparison.

"It is unfortunate that the retiring senator from Arizona feels he must escalate his perpetual assault on President Trump’s character to such a dangerous and indecent level," Kelli Ward, a Republican candidate for Flake's Senate seat, said Tuesday in a written statement. "If Sen. Flake does follow through and deliver this shameful and offensive speech on the floor of the U.S. Senate, it will be an utter embarrassment to Arizona and I will condemn it in the strongest possible terms. I call on all my fellow candidates running for his seat in Arizona to do the same."

Ronna McDaniel, the Republican National Committee chairwoman, also ripped Flake.

McDaniel tweeted: "Sen. Flake, turn on the news. It’s wall-to-wall with biased coverage against @POTUS. He has every right to push back. Comparing the leader of the free world to murderous dictators is absurd. You’ve gone too far."

Flake gave his speech to a mostly empty Senate floor, save for two of his Democratic colleagues — Amy Klobachar of Minnesota and Dick Durbin of Illinois — who watched and then stood to give speeches of their own in support of Flake’s comments.

McCain echoes criticism 

A handful of aides and Senate pages also milled around and roughly three dozen Capitol visitors sat in the box above the Senate floor watching silently. 

Flake got some preemptive support in his effort Tuesday from his senior Arizona Republican colleague, Sen. John McCain, who in a Washington Post guest column similarly blasted Trump for trying to undermine the U.S. media with his "fake news" attacks.

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"While administration officials often condemn violence against reporters abroad, Trump continues his unrelenting attacks on the integrity of American journalists and news outlets," McCain wrote in the Post. "This has provided cover for repressive regimes to follow suit. The phrase 'fake news' — granted legitimacy by an American president — is being used by autocrats to silence reporters, undermine political opponents, stave off media scrutiny and mislead citizens."

Eliza Collins of USA TODAY contributed to this story.

Nowicki is The Republic's national political reporter. Follow him on Twitter, @dannowicki.

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