Roy Moore criticizes a federal court ruling that forces Alabama to recognize the same-sex marriage of a woman who produced campaign ads for his successful campaign for chief justice in 2012.

Cari Searcy, one of the plaintiffs in a lawsuit challenging the state's ban on same-sex unions, said a woman working with Moore's ad agency during the Republican primary that year hired her company, All Good Creatives.

Knowing Moore's stand on homosexuality, Searcy said she was apprehensive to work with him.

"I didn't even think that he would want to work with me," Searcy said. "I struggled whether even to take the job."

Searcy said it was before she appealed Mobile County Probate Judge Don Davis' ruling denying her second-parent adoption of the son she and spouse Kim McKeand have raised since birth. She said there was no way Moore at the time could have known who she was.

"I don't know if he's ever put it together," she said.

For his part, Moore said in an interview Wednesday that he recalls working on campaign ads in Mobile but did not remember that one of the women was involved in the lawsuit. He said his opposition to the court ruling is about a larger constitutional principle and not one marriage.

Roy Moore ... opposes federal ruling on gay marriage.

He said he does not believe the federal government had the authority to change Alabama marriage laws and has advised probate judges not to follow the court order handed down Friday by U.S. District Judge Callie V.S. "Ginny" Granade. That stance drew an ethics complaint Wednesday from the Southern Poverty Law Center.

The TV spot produced by Searcy's company used footage from Moore's unsuccessful gubernatorial run two years earlier and talks about his background as a West Point graduate and Vietnam War veteran. His wife, Kayla, speaks about him upholding family values before Moore makes a direct appeal for support as a woman sings, "Hey, Alabama, it's a brand new day."

Searcy said she also produced a radio ad and a segment that aired on James Dobson's Focus on the Family radio program.

As Searcy recalls the session, Moore arrived at the studio with his wife and a Dobson family member.

Searcy said Moore was nice during the session. She said he led the group in prayer before they began work. Later, she said, he asked her to look at a poem he had written for his wife. She said after the session was finished, he invited her to join the group for lunch, although she declined.

David Kennedy, an attorney for Searcy and McKeand, said the professional relationship between Moore and his client shows that denying the institution of marriage to gays is not abstract.

"It just demonstrates these aren't theoretical people out there," he said. "It's a small world type of thing."

Reporter Mike Cason contributed to this report.