DENVER — Even as an aide hinted that another stimulus bill might be needed, President Obama on Tuesday signed into law the $787-billion package that is a cornerstone of his plan to reverse a dramatic economic downturn.
The stimulus is one of several White House steps designed to preserve or create about 3.5 million jobs and ease the recession.
The president will appear in Phoenix today to roll out a proposal to curb home foreclosures. Obama's Treasury secretary, Timothy F. Geithner, also is crafting a plan to stabilize banks and financial institutions.
Skepticism on Wall Street persists: The Dow Jones industrial average dropped nearly 300 points on Tuesday, or about 3.8%. Still, the president cast the stimulus, the first major piece of legislation passed on his watch, as a crucial milestone.
"I don't want to pretend that today marks the end of our economic problems," he told a crowd of supporters at the Denver Museum of Nature and Science before signing the bill. "Nor does it constitute all of what we're going to have to do to turn our economy around. But today does mark the beginning of the end, the beginning of what we need to do to create jobs for Americans scrambling in the wake of layoffs."
Obama used 10 ceremonial pens to sign the bill, sitting at a wooden table adorned with the presidential seal.
Obama ventured 1,700 miles beyond the Beltway to underscore how the stimulus might help struggling cities recover. Unemployment in the Denver area stands at 6.3%, and home foreclosures numbered more than 1,000 in December. A state-by-state estimate issued by the White House predicted that the stimulus would produce or save 59,000 jobs in Colorado.
It may not be the last stimulus Obama pushes.
Aboard Air Force One en route to Denver, White House Press Secretary Robert Gibbs would not rule out another package. "I wouldn't foreclose it," Gibbs said, "but I wouldn't say at the same time that we are readily making plans to do so."
Obama was introduced in Denver by Blake Jones, chief executive of Namaste Solar, a Boulder-based solar electricity company. With Obama and Vice President Joe Biden standing behind him, Jones said his company had seen business prospects stall as the economy worsened. Passage of the stimulus will "open up markets again," he said, and help the company preserve jobs that might have been lost.
