Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan said upcoming elections should be a “lesson” to the United States, his most explicitly anti-western comment of the campaign so far as he tries to consolidate nationalist support ahead of the vote.

“We have to give a lesson to America” in the May 14 elections, state-run Anadolu Agency cited Erdogan as saying in Istanbul on Sunday, criticizing a visit by US Ambassador Jeff Flake to Erdogan’s main electoral rival, Kemal Kilicdaroglu.

“You are an ambassador. Your interlocutor here is the president”, Erdogan said during a visit to a nationalist youth group. “How will you ask for a meeting with the president from now on?” Erdogan’s door “has been closed to him”, the president added.

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The US envoy visited Kilicdaroglu in Ankara on March 29 “as part of continuing conversations with Turkish political parties on issues of mutual interest,” the US Embassy said in a Tweet.