By JASON HANCOCK 5/18/10 9:25 AM

Democratic U.S. Senate hopeful Bob Krause took exception to one of his rivals calling for closing the "gun-show loophole," saying such a position could cost the party the votes of "hunters and fishermen of all political stripes in our state who enjoy buying and selling firearms at gun shows."

Roxanne Conlin, a Des Moines attorney and frontrunner in the Democratic senate primary, told The Des Moines Register she favors closing the loophole, which allows anyone to buy a gun from a private gun seller at a gun show without a background check.

"... We do not need to make it overly inconvenient for a father to take his son to a gun show and make a lawful purchase there," Krause said. "Gun shows and the hunters who attend them are not the problem. According to law enforcement officials, the problem lies in our inability to track the increased use of weapons in drug trafficking in a timely manner."

Conlin's campaign manager, Mark Daley, told The Iowa Independent that closing the gun-show loophole is a "common sense response nearly everyone, including our Iowa hunters recognize and want to fix."

"The weapons used at Columbine and Virginia Tech were purchased at gun shows," he said. "These tragedies are two glaring reasons why we need to close the gun show loophole."

A recent poll commissioned by the group Mayors Against Illegal Guns found that 87 percent of Americans and 69 percent of National Rifle Association members polled support closing this loophole. Conlin favors closing the loophole, Daley said, because it "makes it too easy for persons with criminal records and mental illnesses to purchase weapons without background checks. "

Krause said a better method to improve the system would be to establish a team of agents within the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives (ATF) to help trace stolen weapons when they are discovered during drug arrests and investigations.

"The ATF is understaffed and unable to track down stolen or illegal weapons acquired by drug runners and other organized criminal elements in a timely manner and this hurts our war on crime greatly," he said. "We need to increase BATF resources to stop the flow of illegal weapons - particularly through drug syndicates."

Last month, gun victims, including those from the 1999 shootings at Columbine High School and the 2007 shooting at Virginia Tech, called on lawmakers to close the loophole.