WASHINGTON – In a rare attack, President Bush’s spokesman yesterday said Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton was “out of bounds” when she used the racially charged term “plantation” to blast Republican leaders in Congress.

Clinton sparked a storm by using Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.’s birthday on Monday to tell a Harlem church audience that the Republican-led House of Representatives is “run like a plantation – and you know what I’m talking about.”

White House press secretary Scott McClellan rarely raps Clinton, but the 2008 election seemed to be on the horizon when he blasted her remarks and rapped her husband’s vice president, Al Gore, for “hypocrisy [that] knows no bounds.”

He then linked Sen. Clinton and Gore, saying: “I think we know one tends to like or enjoy grabbing headlines. The other one sounds like the political season may be starting early.”

He refused to say which zinger was aimed at Gore and which at Sen. Clinton, who also charged at the Harlem event that the Bush administration “will go down in history as one of the worst that has ever governed our country.”

A growing number of Republicans yesterday said Clinton went over the line and some demanded an apology.

Rep. Vito Fossella (R-S.I.) said, “I think it’s outrageous. It clearly crosses the line. At a minimum it’s deserving of an apology to those she equated with racists – the members of the House.

“It undermines the legacy of Dr. Martin Luther King and it minimizes the scourge of slavery by equating slave masters with duly elected members of Congress.”

Former Republican National chairman Rich Bond said: “She has no standing to offer any moral judgments. You know what the White House was like under her husband – you know what I mean. And if you don’t, remember Monica Lewinsky.”

Clinton faced reporters in Midtown last night and said she did not regret what she said.

“I’ve said that before and I believe that it is an accurate description of the kind of top-down way that the House of Representatives is run,” she said.

Then she blasted the House GOP again.

“I hope that people will start thinking about the consequences of having such an incredibly destructive leadership,” she said.

Sen. John McCain (R-Ariz.), a potential Clinton 2008 rival, said of Clinton’s remarks about Republicans: “I don’t think that’s a good description, I really don’t.”

House Speaker Dennis Hastert (R-Ill.) – presumably the prime target of Clinton’s crack – said: “If she’s trying to be racist, I think that’s unfortunate, but I’m not going to comment on that.”

The NAACP and Urban League both declined comment on Clinton’s remarks.