Bill McCollum says gays, lesbians should not be foster parents

TAMPA - Bill McCollum campaigned to garner support in Tampa Monday alongside former Florida Governor Jeb Bush. While he was here, McCollum told reporters that foster kids should not be in the care of gays or lesbians.

"I think the best thing for children is to have a man and a woman, a mother and a father, not gay parents. I don't think that's the right kind of parenting. That's my personal views. Those are my religious views," he said.

McCollum has been fighting a legal challenge brought by a gay South Florida father, Martin Gill, who wants to adopt two foster children he has cared for for six years. Florida currently allows gays and lesbians to be foster parents, but not adopt. Now the Republican Gubernatorial hopeful seems to be ramping up his opposition to both.

"I think that's he's running scared in his primary," said Cathy James, a Tampa mom.

James heads a local political lobbying group called "SOCR," short for "Securing Our Children's Rights" (website: www.socrflorida.org ). The local group fights to overturn what she calls an outdated gay adoption ban in Florida. James and her partner have a 10-year old boy and she argues GLBT parents are fit to adopt and to foster.

"These kids, through no fault of their own, are in the foster care system. All they want to do is to be protected and be loved and have a forever family, and he is hanging his political future on them and that's not a family value that I hold," she said.

With the primary election creeping up on August 24, McCollum has a little more than two weeks to harness the conservative voter base more effectively than his opponent, Rick Scott.

McCollum told reporters he is up to the challenge.