ALBANY, N.Y. (AP) - President Barack Obama and former President Bill Clinton are lending their political star power to an unlikely Democratic bid to win a special congressional election in Upstate New York.

It's in an area that's been a Republican bastion for more than a century. The Nov. 3 contest in New York's 23rd Congressional District is shaping up as a test of a struggling GOP and a possible gauge of Obama's coattails.

Obama carried the district by five percentage points in his landslide victory in New York last year. He forced the special election when he named the incumbent, Republican John McHugh, his Army Secretary. The president will host a fundraiser for the Democratic candidate, Bill Owens, on Tuesday in New York City.

In a fundraising e-mail for Owens, Clinton calls the special election "bigger than just one candidate or one office victory or defeat will also be seen as a referendum on President Obama's agenda."

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