During a late-night TV interview with Jay Leno, President Barack Obama slipped in a plug for three seaports in Georgia, Florida and South Carolina that are seeking federal funds to make room for larger cargo ships.

Obama used his Tuesday night appearance on NBC's "Tonight Show" to push for bipartisan cooperation in funding infrastructure improvements such as widening roads and repairing bridges. The president told Leno that U.S. ports on the East and Gulf coasts need deeper harbors to stay competitive as the Panama Canal finishes a major expansion in 2015 that will give supersized cargo ships a shortcut between the U.S. and Asia.

"If we don't deepen our ports all along the Gulf — (and in) places like Charleston, S.C., or Savannah, Ga., or Jacksonville, Fla. — if we don't do that, these ships are going to go someplace else and we'll lose jobs," Obama said.

It's not the first time Obama has given a shoutout to the ports and their need for deeper shipping channels. A year ago, all three cities were singled out by the White House as being worthy of expedited expansion. Obama mentioned Savannah's $652 million harbor project in May during his graduation speech at Morehouse College in Atlanta. And he just visited the Port of Jacksonville, which wants to deepen 14 miles of the St. Johns River for an estimated $733 million, for a speech on the economy July 25.

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