Jeff Flake takes to Senate floor to suggest Trump committed TREASON by giving 'aid and comfort' to 'enemy' Russia

• President Trump's controversial summit with Vladimir Putin is sparking new further divisions in Congress
• GOP Sen. Jeff Flake and Democratic Delaware Sen. Chris Coons offered an amendment calling for notes from summit, praising Justice Department  
• Flake delivered a blistering speech accusing Trump of providing 'aid and comfort' to Russia 
•  Senate Majority Whip John Cornyn blocked the resolution
•  Senate Leader Mitch McConnell asks two panels to consider sanctions

The Trump-Helsinki summit brought new accusations in Congress Thursday, as GOPSen. Jeff Flake of Arizona accused the president of providing 'aid and comfort' to the enemy.

Flake's choice of words evoked the Constitution's definition of treason – at a time when President Trump is facing a new level of scrutiny for his refusal to forcefully condemn Russian President Vladimir Putin for election meddling during their summit meeting Monday in Finland.

'By choosing to reject objective reality in Helsinki, the president let down the free world by giving aid and comfort to an enemy of democracy. In so doing he dimmed the light of freedom ever so slightly in our own country,' said Flake, a Trump critic who has announced his retirement from the Senate at the end of his term.

Flake accused President Donald Trump of providing 'aid and comfort' to the enemy 

Flake referenced the Intelligence Community's findings that Russia interfered in the presidential election at the direction of Putin and the indictment last week of 12 Russian spies accused of carrying it out.

'To reject these findings and to reject the excruciating specific indictment against the 12 named Russian operatives in deference to the word of a KGB apparatchik is an act of will on the part of the president, and that choice now leaves us Contemplating the dark mystery. Why did he do that?' Flake asked.

Flaked and Democratic Senator Chris Coons of Delaware drafted a resolution to commend the Justice Department and call for hearings to examine what transpired in Helsinki.

But Senate Majority Whip John Cornyn of Texas blocked it from coming immediatley to the floor.

'The way to do our work is through bipartisan committee work, have the witnesses come and testify, ask them hard questions, and render our judgment,' Cornyn, a said.

'I think we should consider sanctions, not sort of Sense of the Sen

ate resolution' that has no 'deterrent effect,' Cornyn said.

Senate Leader Mitch McConnell on Thursday asked two Senate panels to consider sanctions that might further pressure Russia.

The Flake resolution calls for access to any notes from Helsinki, as well as to individuals, after Trump and Putin held a two-hour meeting with only interpreters present. 

'We saw earlier this week in Helsinki what was truly an Orwellian moment, Flake said. 

He referred to efforts to confuse fiction with reality, and said: 'Your mind a hash of conspiracy theory and fragments of old talking points.'

Speaking to the president, he said: 'You failed to summon reality in the face of a despot in defense of your country.' 

Article III of the Constitution states that treason against the United States 'shall consist only in levying War against them, or in adhering to their Enemies, giving them Aid and Comfort. No Person shall be convicted of Treason unless on the Testimony of two Witnesses to the same overt Act, or on Confession in open Court.'