Armed with figures showing escalating housing foreclosures, Sen. Dick Durbin (D-Ill.) was in Chicago on Sunday promoting his bill that would allow judges to force lenders to modify the terms of loans to troubled borrowers.

Durbin introduced the Helping Families Save Their Home Act in October in the U.S. Senate. Mirroring a bill in the House, it calls for a last-resort measure in bankruptcy court that would give judges discretion to work out agreements with lenders that would allow borrowers to keep their primary homes.

Debt is often restructured in bankruptcy cases, but mortgages do not fall under the law. If passed, Durbin's bill will likely force lenders to restructure loan terms before bankruptcy hearings happen, he said Sunday.

"If they know a judge is going to do it anyway, then they will be more inclined to do it beforehand," he said.

Durbin said more than one-quarter of the 2.2 million homeowners facing foreclosure could be helped by the bill. The bill also would allow borrowers to forgo lengthy credit counseling in bankruptcy proceedings and extend time frames that debtors can repay lenders.

"This bill may help them reach a degree of financial stability," Durbin said in a statement Sunday.