Arizona Republican Sen. Jeff Flake criticized President Donald Trump's characterization of the press as “the enemy of the people,” telling MSNBC that it is a term used by Josef Stalin that even Soviet dictators who came after him rejected.
Enemy of the people is a phrase that “was popularized by Josef Stalin, used by Mao as well,” Flake said. “It should be noted that Nikita Khrushchev, who followed Stalin, forbade its use, saying that was too loaded and that it maligned a whole group or class of people, and it shouldn't be done. I don't think that we should be using a phrase that's been rejected as too loaded by a Soviet dictator."
Flake also bemoaned “how damaging it is to have this term fake news around the world that authoritarians everywhere have adopted” in order to dismiss their opposition and legitimate grievances against them.”
Flake, one of the Republican Party's most vocal critics of Trump, is set to give a speech at the Senate on Wednesday to express opposition to Trump and the White House for their treatment of the press, ahead of the president's planned "fake news" awards.
Flake told MSNBC that the purpose of his upcoming speech is “to nudge the president back where I think we as elected officials ought to be. … We can't just retreat into camps like we're doing. People need to stand up and say this is not right. This is not normal. And some of the things that are happening have a lasting impact.”
According to excerpts, Flake will say on Wednesday that 2017 was "a year which saw the truth — objective, empirical, evidence-based truth — more battered and abused than any other in the history of our country, at the hands of the most powerful figure in our government” and that "when a figure in power reflexively calls any press that doesn't suit him ‘fake news,' it is that person who should be the figure of suspicion, not the press."
Flake refused to rule out running for president in 2020, although he told MSNBC that it is not currently in his plans to do so.
Flake said he is sure that some Republicans are thinking of launching a campaign, and it is almost certain that some will declare themselves independent and challenge Trump.
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