Obama touts $1.5 billion in housing aid for hardest hit states

Obama touts $1.5 billion in housing aid for hardest hit states

LAS VEGAS (AP) -- President Barack Obama on Friday planned to offer new help to the states hit hardest by the housing crisis, as he looked to address voter frustration that could threaten his party's hold on Congress. Obama was appearing at a town hall meeting Friday in Las Vegas, where aides said he would unveil a plan for $1.5 billion in housing help. The gambling getaway is the city with the worst foreclosure crisis in the United States. The president's political involvement comes as the Democrats' command of the Senate grows shakier after losing a key seat to Republicans last month, jeopardizing Obama's agenda. The tide of change and anti-Washington sentiment that Obama rode to office little more than a year ago is threatening to slam against his own party in November congressional elections. Obama was to announce that housing finance agencies in the five hardest-hit states in the housing crisis will receive $1.5 billion to help spur local solutions to the problem. Those five are Arizona, California, Florida, Michigan and Nevada. The policy wrinkle comes during a two-day Western trip with different agendas for the president. He will be back in town-hall mode, a venue that aides say allows him to connect with people and distance himself from the messy process of Washington governing. The president is also out to help vulnerable senators protect their seats and, in turn, gain as much legislative leverage as he can. At the town hall and a business speech he will be lending his support to Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid, a Democrat from Nevada who is a top target of Republicans in the November elections. The first day of Obama's western trip was all politics. The president campaigned Thursday for Senator Michael Bennet of Colorado in Denver, then held a $1 million fundraiser for Democrats in Las Vegas. Reid is one of Obama's allies, despite a flap over the president's tendency to refer to Las Vegas as a symbol of imprudent spending, which has the city's mayor fuming at the president. For Obama, slowing the foreclosure rate is a key step in the recovery of the overall economy. Millions of people have lost their homes because they couldn't afford the mortgages anymore, and millions lost jobs because of the associated slowdown in new home building. Reid's state leads the nation in home foreclosures; Las Vegas was the metro area with the highest foreclosure rate in January, with one in every 82 homes receiving such a filing. The money for the new rescue effort will come from the $700 billion financial industry bailout program, according to a senior administration official who spoke anonymously Thursday night because the formal announcement had not been made. Obama will cap his Las Vegas trip with a speech to the city's Chamber of Commerce before returning to Washington later Friday. ___ _Associated Press writers Ben Feller, Darlene Superville and Adrian Sainz contributed to this report._ WATCH THIS 'DAILY RUNDOWN' REPORT ON LAS VEGAS ECONOMIC WOES:

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