WASHINGTON — Sen. Hillary Clinton, a potential White House candidate in 2008, said undocumented immigrants should be given a chance to stay in the United States legally, as she blasted some Republicans for trying to create a “police state” to round up illegal immigrants.

Clinton (D-NY) spoke out on the U.S. immigration policy after largely staying away from an issue that has roiled Congress in recent months and spurred a number of conflicting proposals.

Speaking at a rally of Irish immigrants on March 8, the senator criticized a bill the House passed in December that would impose harsher penalties for undocumented workers.

“Don’t turn your backs on what made this country great,” she said, calling the measure “a rebuke to what America stands for.”

The House measure would make unlawful presence in the United States, which is currently a civil offense, a felony.

Clinton said it would be “an unworkable scheme to try to deport 11 million people, which you have to have a police state to try to do.”

She called instead for immigration changes “based on strengthening our borders in order to make us safer from the threat of terrorism.”

The former first lady also sent a four-page public letter to constituents outlining her views on immigration.

In the letter, she shied away from specifics but said she does support allowing at least some of the estimated 11 million undocumented workers to earn citizenship.

Such changes should include “a path to earned citizenship for those who are here, working hard, paying taxes, respecting the law, and willing to meet a high bar for becoming a citizen,” Clinton wrote.

Senate Judiciary Committee Chairman Arlen Specter (R-PA) has offered legislation that would create separate worker programs: one for illegal immigrants already in the country and another for future immigrant workers.

President George W. Bush has argued for a temporary worker program that would allow illegal immigrants to keep their jobs in hotels, restaurants, nurseries, agriculture and other businesses that depend on low-wage laborers.

Neither effort has gained much momentum, partly due to fierce resistance from others within the GOP.

Specter said emotions on the immigration issue are running high and he has seen “virtually no agreement on anything.”

In her letter, Clinton criticized a bill offered by the chair of the House Judiciary Committee, James Sensenbrenner, Jr. (R-WI), which she said would “target and criminalize the undocumented and punish those who would provide them with humanitarian assistance.”

One of the authors of the House bill, Rep. Peter King (R-NY), fired back at Clinton.

“Illegal immigration has become a national security issue to be discussed intelligently, not with hysterical talk about a police state,” said King, chairman of the House Homeland Security Committee. “Right now, it’s a crime for people to enter illegally but not stay illegally, and we felt that’s an incentive to violate the law. Maybe the Democrats think we should be encouraging people to violate the law.” 

In recent weeks, Clinton has infuriated the GOP by calling the Bush Administration “one of the worst in history” and accusing the Republicans at a Martin Luther King Day observance of running Congress like a “plantation.”

Republican leaders have tried to turn her attacks against her, saying she’s too angry to ever get elected president.