DOBBS: Words of anger and outrage as members of Congress lashed out at President Bush over his inaction in the case of former Border Patrol agents Ignacio Ramos and Jose Compean.

Casey Wian has the story.

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CASEY WIAN, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): It's a sight supporters of former Border Patrol agents Ignacio Ramos and Jose Compean hoped they would never see, two brave men dedicated to so securing the nation's southern border ripped from their wives, six young children, and other grieving family members.

IGNACIO RAMOS, FMR. BORDER PATROL AGENT: And I have to be strong for my kids. They're all I've got.

JOE LOYA, FATHER-IN-LAW OF IGNACIO RAMOS: It's just heart- breaking. It's been a nightmare for 22 months.

WIAN: They began serving 11 and 12-year prison sentences for pursuing, shooting and wounding a Mexican drug smuggler and not properly reporting the incident.

REP. TED POE (R), TEXAS: Altercation on the Texas border. A drug dealer trying to escape with 700 pounds of drugs, a million dollars worth of drugs. He flees from law enforcement to try to stop him. There is a scuffle, shots are exchanged. The border agents don't know whether they shot the offender or not because he escapes back to Mexico.

And the next thing they know is the federal government now gets involved. They chose the enemy, the drug dealer.

Give him immunity. Has already said gave him immunity a second time after he picked up another drug case. Comes in and testifies against our border agents. And today, they're going to prison.

ROHRABACHER: Today is a day of infamy and disgrace. The policies set down by this president is sending the defenders of our borders to prison while rewarding illegal alien drug smugglers.

Shame on you, President Bush. You have betrayed us and our defenders.

BILBRAY: This is an example of the lack of perception of just how out of control our frontier is. That if the administration or anybody in Washington doesn't believe that these agents and every agent that's working down the border are in a battle zone, then they have to look at what's happening on the other side of the border, where police officers and prosecutors are being murdered and killed week by week.

WIAN: Federal judge Kathleen Cardone (ph) denied the agents' request to remain free on bond while their convictions are appealed. In her ruling, she found no exceptional reason exists to allow the agents to remain free, despite the facts that three jurors now say they were coerced to voting guilty, that federal prosecutors did not oppose the motion for continued bail, and that the agents' families are in financial and emotional ruin.

Scores of lawmakers and 250,000 Americans are demanding a presidential pardon. President Bush now faces a full-scale revolt from members of his own party.

REP. TOM TANCREDO (R), COLORADO: And over the Christmas break, the president of the United States pardoned 18 felons. Five of those people were drug dealers. Five drug dealers pardoned at Christmas, but we cannot even get a response to the letters we have sent asking him to pardon the Border Patrol agents.

What greater example of where this president's priorities are than that?

REP. WALTER JONES (R), NORTH CAROLINA: Well, Mr. President, look at your poll ratings. They will soon be less than 20 percent.

Certainly, Iraq is one factor, but another factor is the fact that you do not care about protecting our borders and our heroes who try to arrest a drug smuggler. Mr. President, I hope tonight as you sit with your wife watching TV that maybe you'll see the faces and the families of these two men as they enter federal prison and you've done nothing about it. WIAN: Supporters and the agents say they will continue to fight even from prison.

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WIAN: U.S. Attorney Johnny Sutton released a lengthy statement defending his decision to prosecute the agents and offer immunity to the drug smuggler. In part, it says, "Federal prosecutors cannot look the other way when law enforcement officers shoot unarmed suspects, then lie about it to their supervisors and file official reports that are false."

But there is conflicting testimony about all of Johnny Sutton's claims, conflicts that could be up to an appeals court to resolve -- Lou.

DOBBS: Conflicting statements indeed. As a matter of fact, it is clear that the U.S. attorney and the prosecutors in this case took the word of a drug smuggler, one caught red-handed, fleeing federal authorities, and who later was involved in a subsequent crime over that of the U.S. Border Patrol agents. It is a remarkable case.

WIAN: It certainly is. And as Ted Poe, the congressman from Texas, a former judge, has said, it's the most incredible case he's ever seen in his -- in his career, which includes 22 years as a judge in felony cases in Texas -- Lou.

DOBBS: Well, it's -- this is -- as a number of those congressmen said, this will not stand. The question is how justice will be ultimately served in this country. We have to hope that that is still a possibility.

Casey, thank you very much.

Casey Wian.

Congressman Rohrabacher, Congressman Poe and Congressman Bilbray will all join us here later in this remarkable display of a break with their Republican president, the leader, a titular leader of their party. This is also the subject of our poll tonight.

The question is: Do you believe President Bush should be ashamed, as Congressman Rohrabacher said today, for failing to pardon border agents Compean and Ramos? Yes or no?

Cast your vote at LouDobbs.com. We'll have the results here later.
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Up next here, the Bush administration isolated. Three of the nation's best political analysts join us, Republican members of Congress venting their anger and their outrage at this president over his indifference in the case of border patrol agents Compean and Ramos. Three of the congressmen, Dana Rohrabacher, Brian Bilbray and Ted Poe join us here. All of that and a great deal more still ahead, stay with us.

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DOBBS: It's being called an outrage, a miscarriage of justice, former border patrol agents Compean and Ramos in federal custody tonight, going to prison for doing their duty.

Joining me now three of the congressmen who are trying to support these gentlemen. Congressman Dana Rohrabacher, Congressman Brian Bilbray, both from California, Congressman Ted Poe of Texas, former prosecutor and judge. He's called this one of the most egregious miscarriages of justice he's ever seen.

Gentlemen, good to have you here. I have to say, I don't recall a time when congressional members of the sitting president's party have ever been so direct and so critical of that president. Congressman Rohrabacher, can you remember such a time?

ROHRABACHER: I don't remember any such time, but I don't remember where there was ever a time when the president of the United States was so out of sync with the national security interests of the American people.

And his policies are so wrongheaded that we end up putting the border patrol agents in such a horrible situation that now, what we find is these two border patrol agents who are heroes, putting their lives on the line for us, end up being charged with a crime while the drug dealer goes free. So, I don't ever remember a presidency as out of sync as this one.

DOBBS: Congressman Bilbray, what have you heard from your constituents? What is their thinking as they watch a president, as you gentlemen put it, just arrogantly ignore members of his own party -- congressmen in the House of Representatives, ignoring your entreaties, your letters, not responding in any way?

BILBRAY: Well, I was born and raised along the border and I guess the frustration is the administration, from the bottom up, just does not understand how out of control and violent the border is, the kind of environment that we're asking border patrolmen to work on.

Anybody that looks at the murder rate in Tijuana understands that law enforcement is being killed all along this frontier. And to sit there and second-guess people in a violent area and remember that this was an area where there was a major firefight with assault weapons not too long ago.

DOBBS: Right.

BILBRAY: And all I say is that Mr. President, if you're going consider Mr. Kennedy's amnesty for 12 million illegal aliens, couldn't you just add two more border patrol agents onto that list?

DOBBS: Congressman Poe, Texan, judge, prosecutor, you have watched this unfold in Texas and a number of viewers have said, you know, shame on Texas for permitting this. How do you react?

POE: Well, it is a bad situation that has occurred in our state. The border is out of control. The border agents did their job. The federal government chose to believe the drug dealer and prosecute the border agents. 30,000 Texans have asked the president through petitions to pardon these individuals.

Total number in the United States is almost 250,000 people have signed petitions asking the president pardon them. We want the president to do that. He's pardoned people in the past, over 100 people, some of those are drug offenders. And why not a pardon of two people, border agents? It will send a message, not only to the border patrol that we'll support you, but it will send a message to the drug dealers, don't bring drugs to the United States.

DOBBS: Don't bring drugs to the United States.

BILBRAY: Lou, Lou...

DOBBS: I'm sorry, go ahead.

BILBRAY: ... Lou, we're talking about a message that says that we're going to punish border patrol agents for trying to defend it. But then, we're also sending the message that if your drug smuggler, if you broke the law, you will not only get amnesty and protection, you can make up to $5 million by suing the people.

I mean, the signal and the message sent around the world is scary. This is not the American signal that we want to send. This is not the way we defend our borders.

ROHRABACHER: And the White House now is vilifying these two border patrol agents. The message coming out of the White House now is Ramos and Compean are really terrible human beings.

These are heroic individuals. One of them was up to be border patrol agent of the year right before this incident happened. If we care about our country, we have to control our borders. You know that, Lou. Everybody out that knows that. These agents have been put in a horrible situation because this president has some kind of a policy that we don't know about that, I believe it's an open border policy and it's untenable.

DOBBS: It's untenable, this issue is also a metaphor for, as you both, as you all have suggested. We're now approaching six months this year from September 11. The fact that that border is still, as you say, it is a battle zone across much of its breadth.

ROHRABACHER: I wish it was a battle zone, Lou, because you know what, that would mean we were fighting back. The policy of this administration, people have to understand this, and the reason these two border patrol agents are in trouble, is that they should not fire their weapons until they are fired upon, which means there is no control of the borders whatsoever.

No one will ever stop for a border patrol agents. That tells all the drug dealers and terrorists around the world that our border in the southern part of the United States is open.

DOBBS: Fifty-five congressmen sending a letter to the president on behalf of these agents. The idea that this president would not even respond, that none of his senior staff would respond, that Tony Snow, his White House spokesmen referred to your suggestion as nonsensical, is this, for each of you, is this a break with this president?

POE: Well, we'd think that when 55 members of Congress ask for a specific thing to occur from the administration, we'd at least get an answer. Even a no would be fine. We've had follow-up phone calls, follow-up letters and we have received no communication from the White House about this request.

And we wonder why we haven't even received correspondence in the form of a no. So it is concerning that there is a big disconnect between what occurs in Congress and what members of Congress are asking questions about and an answer from the administration.

BILBRAY: Lou, it's hard to get the message across to anybody in Washington about the conditions along the border. But the administration just needs friends that are willing to be persistent at opening their eyes to the reality of the situation.

ROHRABACHER: I'm going to disagree with you, Brian. I think this president knows darn well what's going on down at the border. He just has a policy that we don't know about. Maybe it's an unstated policy that's an open border policy.

He knows what's going on down there, Brian, but now that puts the Border Patrol in a totally untenable situation where they have to -- what, if the president says you can have an open border, that puts them on the line and now they try to enforce the law and they end up putting the Border Patrol agents in jail.

DOBBS: You gentlemen have described this as a betrayal by the president of these agents, and the responsibility to secure that border.

The lack of response -- I couldn't help but think, to tell it the truth, Congressmen, as you were talking about the lack of response from this White House, that you've just conveyed a feeling that is felt, according to our audience, by millions and millions of Americans in this country who feel they're just not -- their will is not being represented at all in Washington, D.C.

ROHRABACHER: I used to call the White House during the Clinton years and I would get a call back from high level administration officials or the president himself would call me a number of times. This president doesn't return calls and underlings, way down the line, return the calls of elected Congressmen. That's arrogance.

DOBBS: Well, gentlemen, thank you for taking up this cause and we wish you, obviously, all of the luck in the world.

BILBRAY: Thank you, and let's hope that it all works out for the agents and for Americans.

ROHRABACHER: Absolutely.

POE: Thank you, Lou.

DOBBS: Thank you, gentlemen.
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Let's start with the Ramos and Compean issue. Not a single Democrat standing up with those Republicans today. Why not?

ROBERT ZIMMERMAN, DEMOCRATIC STRATEGIST: I can't give you an explanation. I find it a tragic, tragic story. And it's just -- it's not just a personal tragedy for the two Border Patrol agents, but the message to all of our Border Patrol agents is that they're not going to have the United States government watching their back. And I think it's a bipartisan disgrace that there weren't more Republicans and there weren't Democrats speaking out. I applaud those Republicans who did.

DOBBS: All right. And talk to a few Democrats, will you?

ZIMMERMAN: I have.

DOBBS: It is not too easy.

ED ROLLINS, REPUBLICAN STRATEGIST: The critical thing, though, is the president's letting three or four U.S. attorneys go across the country. The message would be loud and clear if he fired the one who first brought these charges and secondly pardoned these guys. No matter what they did, whatever minor infractions they may have committed, they don't deserve to go to jail. And the message to our people on the front line is very, very critical.

DOBBS: The prosecutor in this case, Errol, said to that jury that Ignacio Ramos and Compean had -- "turned against their people" is the way she said it, it clearly a racial remark. Yet, we haven't -- which was -- I mean, it's infuriating on its own. But the fact that they built a case around a convicted -- admitted drug smuggler with a million dollars in drugs, who then, upon getting immunity, committed another crime and built a case on that and took it to a jury. That is about as disgusting a prosecution as you could ask for.

ERROL LOUIS, "NEW YORK DAILY NEWS": You've got a series of laws down there and goals that are all in conflict.

DOBBS: Yes.

LOUIS: For example, they've got ten-year mandatory minimum because there was gun involved. A very tough kind of...

DOBBS: They wanted to -- they wanted him up on murder.

LOUIS: Well, clearly in a case like this, you've got to have somebody step in and this is where the president comes in with mercy, with some sense of justice.

DOBBS: How about a prosecutor with enough sense to know that United States' interests are paramount here and that men and women serving the United States' interests, in this case the Border Patrol agents, have superiority over a drug dealer?

I mean, it's infuriating. And the arrogance, as these Congressmen referred to it, of President Bush in this case and in so many others...

ROLLINS: Well, he's going to pay a price. When 55 members of Congress, basically of his own party -- and he needs to pay attention to the election, there's a lot fewer of his own party there, who basically asked for him to pay attention to this thing, and the excuse is that he's got other things going on, this isn't important, is absurd.