Washington ? Just hours after Congress passed an $18 billion bill to restore unemployment benefits for the long-term unemployed, President Barack Obama made it the law of the land.

The measure comes as welcome relief to hundreds of thousands of people who lost out on the additional weeks of compensation after exhausting their state-paid benefits. They now will be able to reapply for long-term unemployment benefits and receive those checks retroactively under the legislation.

The bill also restores full Medicare payments to doctors who were threatened by a 21 percent cut and refloats the flood insurance program.

Obama signed the bill when he returned to the White House on Thursday night from fundraisers in Miami and a speech earlier in the day at Cape Canaveral, presidential spokesman Bill Burton said.