Tuesday, November 17, 2009

Obama Visits Allentown Dec. 4 For White House to Main Street Tour

Update Dec. 4: Event over. Watch Obama's remarks here.

Update Dec. 4: Live stream here.
Obama will kick off a listening tour on the economy Dec. 4 in Allentown, following a jobs summit Dec. 3.
Obama will tour Allentown Metal Works at 10:50 am. He will speak at 11:50 a.m. at Lehigh Carbon Community College.
The Allentown event is likely to be live streamed at WhiteHouse.gov or cnn.com.
Update Dec. 3: Q&A on the event. From the White House blog:
On Friday, December 4th, President Obama will travel to Allentown, PA to spend some time out of Washington and take the temperature on what Americans are experiencing during these challenging economic times. We visited Allentown in advance to tell the stories of two local small businesses making their way in these difficult times. One, Egypt Star Bakery, is a Lehigh Valley institution, with a close-knit staff dedicated to serving one another and their community. They've weathered the recession by tightening their belts and making some personal sacrifices for the sake of the business. The other, Applied Separations Inc., is a small engineering firm that hires and trains people in green technologies, in some cases retraining workers who have been laid off from other industries. Watch the video that was shown today at the White House Forum on Jobs and Economic Growth to help keep everybody’s focus on what matters:

President Barack Obama has chosen Allentown -- a city known in the national consciousness for its blue-collar character and industrial struggles -- to kick off a listening tour on the economy.

The White House announced the daylong visit Monday night, calling it the first in a series of ''White House to Main Street'' tours, but has not released details.

Obama is expected to make multiple local stops in his first visit to the Lehigh Valley since April 20, when he dropped by the Bethlehem Brew Works in the closing days of the 2008 Democratic primary.

The trip -- the first to the region by a sitting president since 2004 when George W. Bush visited Allentown and Kutztown in the heat of the 2004 presidential campaign -- will come a day after Obama hosts a Dec. 3 Forum on Jobs and Economic Growth at the White House. The Morning Call