'Let The Prisoners Pick The Fruits'

House Republicans Condemn Immigration Bill, Slam Bush Guest Worker Plan

(CBS/AP)  "I don't think he's concerned about alienating voters, he's not running for re-election," said Rep. Tom Tancredo of Colorado. He said Republicans could lose the House and Senate over the immigration issue, and he said of the president: "I wish he'd think about the party and of course I also wish he'd think about the country."

Referring to a wave of demonstrations in recent weeks, Rep. Virgil Goode of Virginia said, "I say if you are here illegally and want to fly the Mexican flag, go to Mexico and wave the American flag."

King analyzed the issue in class terms.

"The elite class in America is becoming a ruling class and they've made enough money by hiring cheap illegal labor that they think they also have some kind of a right to cheap servants to manicure their nails and their lawn, for example.

"So this ruling class, this new ruling class of America, is expanding a servant class in America at the expense of the middle class of America, the blue collar of America that used to be able to punch a time clock, buy a modest house and raise their families. ... Those young people are cut out of this process."

Rep. J.D. Hayworth of Arizona and others said Republicans would pay a price in the midterm elections if they vote for anything like the Senate legislation. "Many of those who have stood for the Republican Party for the last decade are not only angry. They will be absent in November," he said.

Rohrabacher said Americans should be able to "smell the foul odor that's coming out of the U.S. Senate."

Asked a few moments later whether the same odor was emanating from the president, he said, "I have no comment."

Rohrabacher, King and others stood at a podium decorated with a bumper sticker reading "Say No to Amnesty," as the Senate slogged through a second suspenseless day of debate.

The only vote of the day came on a proposal by Frist for a study of the number and causes of deaths at the U.S.-Mexico border. It passed 94-0.

The more difficult choices lie ahead next week, when critics of the bill are expected to try to strip out the guest worker provision and roll back the provisions relating to 11 million illegal immigrants already here.

Sen. Arlen Specter, R-Pa., the chairman of the Judiciary Committee, has said repeatedly he hopes to find a compromise that is more broadly acceptable than the legislation that cleared his committee over the objections of six Republicans.

"There's a movement afoot to find consensus," said Sen. Lindsey Graham, R-S.C., who voted for the bill that cleared committee.

He said the president's statements "have been hugely helpful."