Romney woos NRA

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ST. LOUIS, April 14 (UPI) -- Mitt Romney told a National Rifle Association audience in St. Louis Friday he would be a stronger defender of gun rights than U.S. President Barack Obama.

"If we are going to safeguard our Second Amendment, it is time to elect a president who will defend the rights President Obama ignores or minimizes. I will," the presumptive Republican presidential candidate told the estimated 6,000 NRA members.

The former Massachusetts governor also predicted Obama would try "employing every imaginable ruse and ploy" to restrict gun rights if re-elected in November, an agenda the Democratic president has not pushed in his first term. He also said Obama would "remake" the U.S. Supreme Court.

"In a second term, he would be unrestrained by the demands of re-election," Romney said. "As he told the Russian president last month when he thought no one else was listening, after a re-election he'll have a lot more, quote, 'flexibility' to do what he wants. I'm not exactly sure what he meant by that, but looking at his first three years, I have a very good idea."