Palm Beach Post:
Gov. Charlie Crist said he has had an “appropriate evolution”
regarding gay rights and is considering dropping the state’s
lawsuit challenging a gay couple’s adoption of two foster
children.
“I think we need to review that. My comments really reflect that
it’s better to have more of the judicial branch involved in this
process. I think that most who follow the judiciary recognize that
what’s in the ‘best interest of the child’ is what should be
paramount in these kinds of decisions. That’s what I believe and
I think that’s what will be the best for them,” Crist, the
independent candidate in the three-way race for U.S. Senate, told
reporters.
Crist’s campaign this week released a position paper backing a
swath of gay rights – including the right to adopt. Florida has
one of the country’s most strident anti-gay adoption laws.
The Department of Children and Families, one of Crist’s agencies,
is challenging a judge’s ruling that the law is unconstitutional.
DCF appealed the adoption of his two foster children granted to
Martin Gill. An appeals court decision in the lawsuit, fought by
Attorney General Bill McCollum’s office on behalf of DCF, could
come any time.
Why not just drop the case? One reporter pushed.
“I’m going to review it before I would make that call,” he
insisted.
Crist the candidate has considerably softened his stance towards
gay rights in the four years since he ran for governor, when he
opposed gay marriage.
Why the change, he was asked.
“Not a whole lot has changed to be candid. I also said (back in
2006) that I’m a live-and-let-live kind of guy. And I am. As I
said this morning, I think that the older you get, the less
judgmental you become,” Crist said. “Maybe I was more rigid
earlier. But I don’t feel that way. And I know who’s supposed
to be judging people and it’s not me.”