President Bush on Wednesday underscored his threat to veto major legislation designed to address the housing and mortgage crisis, even as the House was working to pass the measure later in the day.

After meeting with the House Republican Conference, Bush said, “I will veto the bill that’s moving through the House today if it makes it to my desk, and I urge members on both sides of the aisle to focus on a good piece of legislation that is being sponsored by Republican members.”

The package (HR 3221) slated for a vote Wednesday combines several major bills, including a regulatory overhaul of mortgage finance giants Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, and a modernization of the Federal Housing Administration. The White House has long sought both of those measures.

But Bush opposes a cornerstone of the package that would provide $300 billion in new authority for the FHA to insure refinanced loans for struggling home owners.

“First of all, we are committed to a good housing bill that will help folks stay in their house, as opposed to a housing bill that will reward speculators and lenders,” Bush said.

House Majority Leader Steny H. Hoyer, D-Md., rebutted that charge.

“Nothing could be further from the truth,” he said. “Our housing rescue bill, which has attracted bipartisan support, specifically excludes speculators, investors, and second homes, and requires lenders to take losses.”

House Financial Services Committee Chairman Barney Frank, D-Mass., who has shepherded the package to the floor, said the White House opposition may have more to do with the November elections than the current slowdown in the housing market.

The White House has “decided to stop governing  . . .  and not allow the [Democratic] Congress to claim anything constructive,” Frank charged.

In a statement of administration policy criticizing the House package, the White House said inclusion of the Fannie and Freddie overhaul and FHA modernization was largely symbolic, because both bills (HR 1427, HR 1852) have previously passed the House, and the FHA measure has also passed the Senate (S 2338). The administration pressed Congress to agree on those measures “consistent with the administration’s principles.”

But the House has taken a relatively expansive approach to addressing housing market woes, with Frank working for weeks to fine-tune the proposal (HR 5830) to allow the FHA to insure refinanced mortgages if lenders accept a write-down to reflect reduced current market values.

Lawmakers appear to have resolved problems with an amendment to the package proposed by North Carolina Democrat Brad Miller and Ohio Republican Steven C. LaTourette that would prevent any provision in the bill or two major federal banking statutes — the Home Owner’s Loan Act or the National Bank Act — from pre-empting any state law dealing with residential foreclosures.

Financial services trade groups, including the American Bankers Association and the Mortgage Bankers Association, decried the amendment, saying it could interfere with national banking regulation efforts.

Miller said Wednesday that lawmakers had worked out “fairly modest” changes that would “make [the industry] less apoplectic.” The modified amendment would bar pre-emption of any state law dealing with “the foreclosure process.” The original amendment did not include the word “process.”

Miller said major industry groups would not oppose the modified language, which will be offered to the original language on the floor in a unanimous consent request. Miller and industry lobbyists expect that request to succeed.

The Senate in April cleared a narrower version of HR 3221 that focused on tax breaks for money-losing businesses and modernization of the FHA. Senators declined to include either an expansion of the FHA’s loan guarantee program or an overhaul of the regulatory scheme for Fannie and Freddie.

Frank had hoped to deliver a housing package to Bush by July 4. But the two chambers will have to resolve their differences before then, and the veto threat could make it harder to build consensus in the Senate.

The White House on Tuesday separately threatened to veto a related housing bill (HR 5818) that also was on the schedule for a House vote Wednesday. That measure, sponsored by Rep. Maxine Waters, D-Calif., would authorize $15 billion in loans and grants for states to buy and rehabilitate foreclosed properties.

Some Republicans, particularly from states such as Ohio and Florida that have been hard hit by rising foreclosures, are expected to support Frank’s broad housing package.

But Republican leaders are supporting an alternative offered by Rep. Lee Terry, R-Neb., that would offer a one-year $10,000 tax credit for buyers of homes among other provisions.

Republicans on Wednesday were delaying floor action on the housing bills as part of their ongoing protest against Democratic plans to bring an Iraq war spending bill directly to the floor, denying them the opportunity to weigh in on the measure in a committee markup.