On Thursday, FreedomWorks chairman Dick Armey told CNN’s Soledad O’Brien that Barack Obama is “the biggest threat to our liberty in the history – in our lifetime.”

The former Texas Congressman appeared on CNN’s Starting Point to discuss gun control, and whether the Tea Party would rally around presumptive GOP nominee Mitt Romney, Mediaite reported.

O’Brien said that Armey “sounded incredibly underwhelmed by a Mitt Romney candidacy” last summer and wondered if the Tea Party’s position on the former Massachusetts governor had changed.

“I never said that they would never come out for Mitt Romney,” he said, explaining that the small-government group has been disappointed by both Republicans and Democrats.

“We have been about the business of recruiting what we call ‘legislative entrepreneurs’ in the guise of liberty and small government. And we are going to be getting them elected. But we are all aware that the greatest threat to constitutionally limited small government and personal liberty that we see active in politics in America today is President Obama,” he told O’Brien.

“I mean, this guy is — in fact, we see him clearly. He’s obsessed with controlling the distribution of income, the distribution of product, the behavior of people, the allocation of capital resources to goofy social causes that are inspired by bad science and bad finance,” he added.

Armey also told O’Brien that Romney is the Republican nominee, and “the one person that we have that is in the position to defeat Obama.”

“Is Romney everything we would hope to have?” Armey asked. “No. But is President Obama proven to be everything we were afraid he might be? Yes. So, obviously, if you get a 180 degree turn-around and you get a Romney that’s not perfectly in agreement with us as opposed to a President Obama who is openly contemptuous of our values, then clearly we’ve made a big turn-around by working for it.”

During the primary season, many Tea Party conservatives viewed Romney as a “RINO” – a “Republican in name only.”

In April, Judson Phillips, head of the Tea Party Nation, told the Daily Caller that the “tea party is not going to coalesce around Romney.”

“Most of us will vote for Romney, but we will not be out there with signs for him or in his campaign,” he said.

But that attitude seems to be changing among many as the election draws closer.

On Wednesday, the Washington Examiner noted:

“Tea Party activists and supporters of Ron Paul are expected to back GOP presidential nominee Mitt Romney, but they’d like one thing from him first: Romney’s endorsement of the former candidate’s call to audit the Federal Reserve.”

According to the Examiner, Romney “recently sent out a tweet complimenting Paul’s ‘Audit the Fed’ campaign, an indication he might adopt Paul’s call.”

Before Ron Paul’s “Audit the Fed” bill overwhelmingly passed the House on Wednesday, Romney tweeted his support.

“Ron Paul’s Audit The Fed bill is a reminder of his tireless efforts to promote sound money and a more transparent Federal Reserve,” he said on July 18.

The National Journal, citing a July Pew Research poll, said that “97 percent of those who identify themselves as tea party voters support Romney.”

But the Journal also pointed out that Romney faces a “few major tests.”

“They include his choice of running mate and the message that is broadcast from the convention stage in Tampa,” Naureen Khan wrote.