Foreign Affairs Minister Dermot Ahern has expressed his disappointment at the US Senate vote on immigration reform in the US.
In a major setback for President Bush, the Senate refused today to advance legislation that would have brought lawful status for many of the estimated 12 million illegal immigrants, including tens of thousands of Irish people.
Sen John Kerry on the defeat of the Immigration Bill
The bill's supporters fell 14 votes short of the 60 needed to limit debate and clear the way for final passage of the legislation, which critics attacked as offering amnesty to illegal immigrants. The vote was 46 to 53 in favour of limiting the debate.
In a statement released this evening, Mr Ahern said:
"This set-back will not diminish our determination to secure the fair deal for the Undocumented Irish and their families."
"I greatly regret that the courageous efforts of many members of the US Senate to achieve support for a wide ranging, cross-party bill on immigration reform, has not been successful in attracting the necessary level of support to ensure its progress.
"I have asked our Ambassador in Washington to provide a full assessment of the situation we now face so that we can review how our efforts can best be brought forward for the benefit of our undocumented in the US.
"In addition, we will maintain our engagement with key Members of the US Congress and I have already been in contact with the Irish Lobby for Immigration Reform which provides an effective voice for the Irish undocumented throughout the US.
"This set-back will not diminish our determination to secure the fair deal for the Undocumented Irish and their families," he added.
Mr Bush has sought immigration reform for years, but the vote made it unlikely he will achieve that significant domestic legislative victory before leaving office in a year and a half.
The result is a victory for Republican conservatives who strongly criticised the bill's provisions. They were aided by talk radio and TV hosts who repeatedly attacked the bill and urged listeners to flood Congress with calls, faxes and e-mails.
The bill would have toughened border security and brought a new system for weeding out illegal immigrants from workplaces. It would have created a new guest worker programme and allowed millions of illegal immigrants to obtain legal status if they briefly returned home.
Conservatives from Bush's own party led the opposition.
They repeatedly said the government must secure the borders before allowing millions of illegal aliens a path to legal status.
Sen. Elizabeth H. Dole, R-N.C., said many Americans "don't have confidence" that borders, especially with Mexico, will be significantly tightened. "It's not just promises but proof that the American people want," Dole said.
But the bill's backers said border security and accommodations to illegal immigrants must go hand in hand.
"Year after year, we've had the broken borders," said Sen. Edward Kennedy, D-Mass. "Year after year, we've seen the exploitation of workers."
After the vote, he said: "It is now clear that we are not going to complete our work on immigration reform. That is enormously disappointing for Congress and for the country."
Sen. Dianne Feinstein, D-Calif., told colleagues that if the bill faltered, the political climate almost surely would not allow a serious reconsideration until 2009 or later. It would be highly unlikely, she said, "in the next few years to fix the existing system ... . We are so close."
From the beginning, the bill's most forceful opponents were southern Republicans. GOP Sens. David Vitter of Louisiana, Jim DeMint of South Carolina and Jeff Sessions of Alabama led the charge, often backed by Texan John Cornyn.
Two southern Republicans - Lindsey Graham, S.C., and Mel Martinez, Fla., who was born in Cuba - supported it.
Also crucial to the bill's demise was opposition from three Democrats recently elected from GOP-leaning states. They were Jon Tester of Montana, Claire McCaskill of Missouri and Jim Webb of Virginia.
Sen. John Kerry, D-Mass., called the vote "a victory for fear-mongering and obstruction over a bipartisan commitment to fix our broken immigration system."