LITTLE ROCK (AP) – Supporters of a proposal aimed at barring homosexuals from adopting or fostering children turned in petitions on Monday in a bid to put the measure before voters this fall, but acknowledged they’ll likely fall short of the required number of valid signatures.

Meanwhile, backers of a ballot measure aimed at denying state benefits for illegal immigrants said they’re at least 10,000 signatures short.

Monday was the deadline for supporters of proposed ballot measures to submit signatures with the state. If the petitions are found to not have enough valid signatures, supporters have another 30 days to gather signatures. Both the immigration- and adoption-initiated acts required at least 61,974 valid signatures.

Jerry Cox, president of the Family Council Action Committee, said the group had gathered 65,899 signatures in support of the proposed initiated act banning unmarried couples living together from fostering or adopting children.

Cox said he expected that a number of signatures would be tossed out by the secretary of state’s office and hoped to gather as many as 15,000 additional signatures. The petitions submitted fell short of the 100,000 signatures.

“People simply have not been paying attention to this issue and I think that’s been the greatest difficulty,” Cox said. “It’s not a lack of support as much as it is a lack of attention to the issue.”

Opponents said the low number of signatures turned in shows how little support there is for the ban. The restriction has faced opposition from the state’s top officials, including Gov. Mike Beebe and Attorney General Dustin McDaniel.

A representative from Arkansas Families First, a coalition opposed to the ballot measure, said the group will monitor the signature verification process and has not ruled out challenging the measure in court.

“This ballot measure goes way too far, and I think that’s one of the reasons why they’re having trouble getting signatures,” said Jennifer Ferguson, legal director for Arkansas Advocates for Children and Families, which is part of the coalition opposed to the ban.

The state Supreme Court in 2006 struck down a state policy that specifically banned gays and lesbians from becoming foster parents. State policy currently bars unmarried couples living together from serving as foster parents.

Support for placing the foster care and adoption restriction on the ballot hasn’t matched the enthusiasm the Family Council saw in its campaign to ban same-sex marriage in the state four years ago. Cox said his group submitted about 200,000 signatures in support of that proposed constitutional amendment, which was overwhelmingly approved by voters.

A group billing itself as Secure Arkansas appeared likely to fall short of its goal to place its immigration measure on November’s ballot. Jeannie Burlsworth, the group’s chairwoman, told The Associated Press that volunteers were still hoping more signatures would come in the mail Monday. Burlsworth says her group “tried to sweep them in and they’re still out there.”

SAN FRANCISCO (AP) – Presidential candidate Barack Obama has come out against a ballot measure that seeks to outlaw same-sex marriage.

A club for gay Democrats in San Francisco says it solicited a statement from the Illinois senator’s campaign in which he called the proposed constitutional amendment “divisive and discriminatory.”

Obama also extended congratulations to gay and lesbian newlyweds who have gotten married in California over the last two weeks.

His letter was read aloud at the Alice B. Toklas LGBT Democratic Club’s annual gay pride breakfast on Sunday.

Last week, Republican rival, Sen. John McCain, endorsed the same-sex marriage ban that is slated to appear on the November ballot.

Obama has said he is personally opposed to same-sex marriage but thinks the issue should be left to states to decide.

LOS ANGELES (AP) – Former basketball star Magic Johnson’s normally publicity-shy wife Cookie is emerging as a spokeswoman in a campaign urging black women to get tested for HIV.

Cookie Johnson is appearing with the former LA Lakers star in a five-year, $60 million public service campaign with ads directed by moviemaker Spike Lee.

She was two months pregnant when her husband tested positive for HIV in 1991.

The Henry J. Kaiser Foundation says almost a third of cases diagnosed among U.S. blacks in 2006 were women, double the rate for white women.

Cookie Johnson, who tested negative for the virus, says part of the community still has the attitude that “it can’t happen to me.”

PORTLAND, Maine (AP) – An adult adoption involving lesbian partners and a claim on one of America’s premier business fortunes has been annulled.

At issue is whether it was legal for a judge in Maine to allow Olive Watson to adopt Patricia Spado in 1991. Watson’s father was Thomas Watson, who built IBM into a computer giant.

Spado and Olive Watson’s relationship ended a year after the adoption. Thomas Watson’s heirs challenged the adoption in court in 2005.

The judge who granted the adoption annulled it last spring on a residency issue. Her ruling didn’t come to light until appeal briefs were filed with Maine’s supreme court last week.

Spado and Watson lived in New York but spent several weeks each summer on an island in Maine’s Penobscot Bay.

WAYLAND, Michigan (AP) – Two female Michigan high school students who were videotaped attacking a classmate have been formally arraigned on charges of aggravated assault.

Crystal VanderLaan and Sydnee Rae Longhurst are accused of beating a Wayland Union High School classmate on June 10 as another student, who has not been charged, videotaped the attack.

The video was posted on the Internet shortly after school ended, said Wayland Police Chief Dan Miller.

The attack also was caught on tape by a security camera at the school. The victim suffered bruises, according to the police report.

VanderLaan has been expelled, her attorney said. Longhurst has moved out of the school district and could not be disciplined by the school board at its Monday meeting.

The girls face one count each of aggravated assault in Allegan County Family Court. If convicted, they face a maximum of one year in a juvenile detention facility and a $1,000 fine.

VanderLaan and Longhurst were upset over the victim’s public displays of affection, according to the police report. The victim told police she believes it was because of her sexual orientation.

BEAVERTON, Ore. (AP) – A school district in Oregon is facing a $125,000 lawsuit from a former music, drama and language arts teacher.

Wade Willis says he had no choice but to resign after he proposed staging a controversial play at Southridge High and was “harassed, intimidated and humiliated.”

The play was “The Laramie Project,” about the 1998 murder of gay college student Matthew Shepard in Laramie, Wyo.

School officials shut down the production in September 2005, saying the play had profanity and sexual content, though a play committee later voted that it be put on under certain conditions.

District officials declined to comment.

NASHVILLE, Tenn. (AP) – Taking an HIV test in the pulpit Sunday morning was itself simple.

At Spruce Street Baptist Church, one of Nashville’s oldest and most established predominantly African-American congregations, a public health worker opened the test kit and handed the swab it contained to the Rev. Raymond Bowman.

Bowman opened his mouth and, well, swabbed.

In the two minutes that it took, there was awkward silence. There were murmurs. Musicians broke into a low-volume instrumental, usually reserved for moments of prayer.

That scene, or something like it, was repeated June 29 in 26 other predominantly African-American churches around Nashville.

The tests and the messages from pastors that followed about the value and ease of HIV testing, the opportunity for a free test and the need for every adult to know their status were part of a Metro Health Department effort to harness the power and influence of black churches to slow the spread of HIV.