An ongoing divide between the House Republican Leadership and Senate conservatives went public Tuesday when Speaker John Boehner, R-Ohio, took the unusual step of calling out by name two conservatives who have been outspoken opponents of immigration reform: Senators Ted Cruz of Texas and Jeff Sessions of Alabama.

As the Senate moves forward with debate on a bill to fund the Department of Homeland Security, which the House already passed and contains language scaling back President Obama’s executive actions on immigration, Boehner urged the senators to help pass the bill.

“It is time for Senator Cruz and Senator Sessions and Senate Republicans and Senate Democrats to stand with the American people and to block the president’s actions," Boehner said.

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Boehner and his Leadership team have taken a lot of criticism from conservatives, led by Cruz and Sessions, for not doing enough to stop President Obama’s executive actions regarding immigration reform.

Leadership aides tell NBC News that Boehner’s decision to publicly name the two GOP Senators that have long been thorns in his side regarding immigration is predicated on his belief that the Senate must take up a version that can actually become law.

The bill in question is a measure that Boehner brought up last month to placate many House conservatives, Boehner passed a bill that contained far reaching immigration language including a repeal of Obama’s 2012 executive action on immigration known as DACA, or Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals. That decision cost the Leadership some support from more moderate GOP members, especially ones with a large amount of Latinos in their district. It also put the Republican Party in a precarious position with Latino groups as the 2016 presidential race begins to heat up.

Nevertheless, Boehner felt it was important to move the more conservative bill forward to prove to House conservatives that for it to become law, it would need to be herded through the Senate by the very conservative Senators who have said the House hasn’t done enough to stand up to the president on immigration. By calling out Cruz and Sessions today, aides confer it was Boehner’s way of saying, “the ball is in your court,” and that it was up to them to convince Republicans and even Democrats who were leery of Obama’s executive actions to support the bill or “show what they can pass.”

One outside conservative group that holds a lot of sway with House and Senate conservatives—Heritage Action—was not impressed with Boehner’s latest move. Spokesman Dan Holler told NBC News: “Name checking Sessions and Cruz doesn’t advance the ball – or in leadership parlance, it isn’t helpful.”