RUSH: Look, I know that there’s big immigration news out there, and I was right, Boehner was just shining us on, folks, as we suspected earlier in the week. The GOP annual retreat is going on, and Mitch McConnell has basically told the House Republicans, “I don’t care what you send over here on immigration, we probably are not gonna pass it.” And it’s one of the things that we speculated on earlier in the week.

One of two things is gonna happen with the House immigration bill, and this is an immigration bill designed to deny Obama the money necessary to implement his amnesty executive orders. The bill’s either gonna die in the Senate or they’ll pass it and Obama will veto it, and they don’t have enough votes to override it. And after the veto, or after the bill dies, I said that’s where the real focus is, because then we’ll know what the real intentions are.

Well, I think we already know now, because at the retreat McConnell has pretty much said we’re not gonna pass this. The donors to the Republican Party do not want any opposition to amnesty, however it happens, if Obama does it, the Republicans, they don’t care. They just want an end to deportations and the normalization of the illegal immigrants who are here now.

So all of the talk that we’ve been hearing, tough talk, about Obama violating Constitution and Obama this and Obama that and we gotta stand up to it, how Obama himself doesn’t have the power to do all this, it appears that that was just a little red meat for the Republican base to feast on for a while in an attempt to tide them over through the next hunger strike.

But I have more details on that as the program unfolds.

BREAK TRANSCRIPT

RUSH: Let’s focus on the Republicans and this whole immigration thing and the Republican retreat. A short review. On Monday we had an AP story that was really pummeling Boehner, because he was speaking in terms of red meat for conservatives. He was hammering Obama on violating the Constitution and violating immigration law, executive actions, all these kinds of things.

AP was mad. They were criticizing Boehner for doing it. Boehner hung in nevertheless. They were trying to shame Boehner into talking out of it, and they were kind of giving him a little business for not reacting more strongly and defiantly dealing with these traitors who had voted against him in the Speaker’s vote.

Anyway, we came to Wednesday, and Boehner did a stem-winder of a speech — well, for the Republicans it was a stem-winder of a speech on the floor of the House in which he just took it to Obama on all of his constitutional violations, and he quoted Obama claiming how he couldn’t violate the Constitution and then gave examples of him doing just that. And there were conservative media that got kind of excited about it, and said, “Wow, okay, maybe we hold out hope. Maybe they see the light.”

And I found a post at Conservative Review which said that they had already uncovered news that all of this was just for show, all of this stridency, all this beating up on Obama and all this Republican fist pounding saying they aren’t gonna put up with these executive actions on amnesty, blah, blah, blah. That what was really going on was a behind-the-scenes plan to make executive amnesty, executive orders legal and make ’em all happen after either Obama vetoes the House bill or the Senate fails to pass it.

Well, now we arrive to Friday. And let me just give you two stories to kick this off, one from TheHill.com; one from the AP. The Hill headline is: “McConnell to House GOP: DonÂ’t Expect Miracle on Immigration — Senate GOP leaders are using their joint retreat with the House to warn conservatives that theyÂ’re not going to be able to reverse President ObamaÂ’s executive orders on immigration.”

Now, TheHill.com thus wants all of us to know that McConnell is giving up already, which, you know, what a surprise. But, it’s okay. The Republican leadership, it says, need to save their ammo for the next fight. They can’t stop him. They gotta save their ammo. This is always what we’re told. Yeah, we don’t have any ammo on this one, but we’re gonna save our ammo and we’re gonna build up our stock, and then next time, boy, we’re gonna take it to them. How many times do we hear that during every continuing resolution debate, every spending debate.

“Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) told House lawmakers that he needs at least six Democrats to pass legislation approved by the House that funds the Homeland Security Department and repeals ObamaÂ’s actions deferring deportation for millions of illegal immigrants.”

The House bill would defund the small areas of Homeland Security Obama needs to pay for his amnesty. The House bill, take the money away to do it. McConnell’s basically saying, “No, no, no. We don’t have the votes here. We control the Senate, but we don’t have the votes, so don’t expect any miracles.” Since it would take 60 Senate votes to send the bill to Obama’s desk, and McConnell only has 54 Republican votes. I don’t understand this. It takes 60 votes for a veto-proof bill, but they don’t need 60 votes to pass a bill. See, this is… (interruption) They need cloture on this? Okay. So they would need 60 votes for cloture. For some reason I thought — all right. So he’s saying he can’t even get cloture. He can’t even get to a final vote.

Anyway. Now, the AP story on this: “Not exactly brimming with confidence, Majority Leader Mitch McConnell says heÂ’s going to try to push a House-passed bill to overturn President Barack ObamaÂ’s immigration policies through the Senate. But neither McConnell nor other members of his leadership — and not even senior House Republicans — predict success for the plan that undoes ObamaÂ’s moves and exposes hundreds of thousands of younger immigrants to deportation. ‘Good question,’ Sen. John Thune, R-S.D., said Thursday when asked about the billÂ’s prospects in the Senate. ‘ItÂ’s a process,’ added Rep. Cathy McMorris Rodgers, R-Wash., equally noncommittal on the subject as Republicans held a joint retreat.

“‘WeÂ’re going to try to pass it. ThatÂ’ll be our first choice,’ McConnell told reporters at a news conference at the homey Hershey Lodge. ‘If weÂ’re unable to do that, weÂ’ll let you know what comes next.’ … ‘ItÂ’s very difficult to craft language in a way that takes aim at the overreach by the president with his executive authority and yet doesnÂ’t impede DHSÂ’s enforcement of the law,’ said Sen. Susan Collins, R-Maine.”

So what they’re saying is, “Hey, look, you know, we would love to do this, but we need the Department of Homeland Security to function. We can’t veto funding for the Department of Homeland Security, especially not now with militant Islamist terrorists all over the place.” But the legislation doesn’t defund Homeland Security. It defunds just a small part of it necessary for Obama to implement amnesty. It does not defund Homeland Security.

So what we are left with here, they’re trying, oh, my gosh, are they trying, so hard, just a can’t get there, damn it, no matter. We keep winning elections, just can’t get there. They can’t get 60 votes, they can’t shut down debate in the Senate, they can’t move on to a final vote. And then, from Breitbart News — oops. Break time. There’s one more. There’s a member of the House, Jeff Denham, who doesn’t want any part of it. He just wants to go ahead and make this amnesty permanent, get it done, and have the Republicans stand behind it.

And he says, by the way, that the party is quietly crafting a broad immigration bill behind the scenes anyway. And he says (paraphrasing), “Have you seen Obama’s numbers on this? Are you sane? We have to go along. The only way we can survive is to support amnesty. Have you seen Obama’s numbers on this?”

BREAK TRANSCRIPT

RUSH: You know, I guess I, and probably a lot of you, just come from an old school. Okay, here’s McConnell, he’s in the Senate, we got something serious. We have a president violating the Constitution. He’s gonna grant amnesty, outside the Constitution, to five million, 11 million illegal immigrants. Republicans just won the Senate. They have 54 members, 54 votes. They’re six votes shy of what they need. You mean to tell me that McConnell can’t go on TV and shame six Democrats into joining them? What we’re talking about here is defending the Constitution, for crying out loud.

Are there not six Democrats that could not be appealed to on the basis of defending and protecting the Constitution, the oath they take? Why don’t you at least make the effort? Are they afraid they might convince six, afraid they might win? Is it in the bag the Republicans want amnesty anyway and all this is just for show? Okay, so you need 60 votes. Change the rules like Harry Reid did. Eliminate cloture on this one. Just say all we need’s 54 or 53 votes to pass it. Play the game like Harry Reid did. He changed the rules whenever he needed the rules to be changed or to get what he wanted. If you don’t want to change the rules, if they don’t want to monkey with it like that, what’s wrong with going on TV and making an appeal to six Democrats.

Are there not six Democrats who want to vote and defend the Constitution of the United States? That would be a great message. Not one Democrat in the US Senate willing to defend the Constitution. What a great message for a future campaign. And then on this stupid business of the defunding Homeland Security, this bill does not defund Homeland Security. It defunds three small parts of it that Obama needs to pay money to have these illegals amnestified, whatever you want to call it.

If there were to be a veto of the bill, it would be Obama who would be defunding Homeland Security, not the Republicans. The Republicans are not defunding at all. Not even willing to fight for that. Make Obama veto it. Put the onus on him. It tells me that all this is for show, and as we’ve always suspected, the Republicans are all-in on amnesty anyway.