Sen. Jeff Flake speaks out against Donald Trump in latest op-ed
Nov 7, 2017, 4:45 AM | Updated: 12:31 pm
Sen. Jeff Flake, R-Ariz., a member of the Foreign Relations Committee, returns to his office after a closed-door security briefing at the Capitol in Washington, Wednesday, Oct. 25, 2017. (AP Photo/J. Scott Applewhite)
(AP Photo/J. Scott Applewhite)
PHOENIX — U.S. Sen. Jeff Flake (R-Ariz.) continued to speak out against President Donald Trump in a recent opinion article, saying the president’s behavior continues to disfigure the “American sense of well-being.”
In an article for The New York Times, Flake wrote that he has received thousands of calls and letters from constituents last month after he announced he would not be running for re-election in 2018.
Many of the letters and calls, Flake said, thanked him for speaking out against the president and his behavior.
Flake said the overwhelming trend of comments he received were “plaintive, anguished, deeply engaged and urgent.”
“They all have in common a feeling of distress that the country has taken a sudden and caustic turn, that we have a president who seems to take pleasure in dividing us,” he wrote.
“A president who is careless with the position that has become known in the past century as ‘leader of the free world, and that our institutions and maybe even our liberty are in peril as a consequence.”
The most common request the Arizona senator received? “Please… Don’t stop speaking out. ‘I’m counting on it,’ one person wrote.”
“These writers despair not because of the chaos emanating from the White House, but because of the moral vandalism that has been set loose in our culture, as well as the seeming disregard for the institutions of American democracy,” he said.
“The damage to our democracy seems to come daily now,” Flake added. “As this behavior continues, it is not just our politics being disfigured, but the American sense of well-being and time-honored notions of the common good.”
In one pointed statement, Flake acknowledged that every president at one time or another has made poor decisions, but said “things will not improve” under Trump.
“As a conservative, I do not seek conflict with the president of the United States,” Flake wrote. “But the experiences of this year…have made me realize that to stand up and speak out is sometimes the most conservative thing a citizen can do.”
