Republican Sen. Jeff Flake of Arizona plans to give a speech on Wednesday, comparing President Donald Trump's comments on the media to those once made by Soviet dictator Joseph Stalin, The Washington Post reported.
Flake plans to deliver the speech before Trump announces the winners of his "Fake News Awards," according to the Post.
Trump announced on Twitter earlier this month he would award the "most corrupt & biased of the Mainstream Media" "losers" on January 17.
One of Trump's most frequent critics, Flake told the Post he would use his speech to denounce Trump for calling the news media "the enemy of the American people."
"It is a testament to the condition of our democracy that our own president uses words infamously spoken by Josef Stalin to describe his enemies," Flake will say, according to the excerpts of the speech provided to the Post. "It bears noting that so fraught with malice was the phrase 'enemy of the people,' that even Nikita Khrushchev forbade its use, telling the Soviet Communist Party that the phrase had been introduced by Stalin for the purpose of 'annihilating such individuals' who disagreed with the supreme leader."
Flake said last year that, come November, he will not seek a second term in Senate amid political pressure stemming from his criticism of the president.