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James accuses Fox Sports of religious discrimination

College football analyst Craig James, who was fired by Fox Sports Southwest after just one week on the job, said he was let go because of his religious beliefs.

Fox cited anti-gay comments James made as the reason for terminating him when the network announced the firing. He made just one appearance on the network in late August before getting fired.

James said the comments were expressions of his religious beliefs, and reasoned that Fox has a ban on religious people working at the network. He has hired an attorney.

"I was shocked that my personal religious beliefs were not only the reason for Fox Sports firing me but I was completely floored when I read stories quoting Fox Sports representatives essentially saying that people of faith are banned from working at Fox Sports," James told Breitbart.com. "That is not right and surely someone made a terrible mistake."

Fox Sports said in a statement earlier this week that James "was not a good fit for Fox Sports" and "is a polarizing figure in the college sports community."

The network also said that James' anti-gay comments would not be tolerated by the network's human resources department and that his hiring was not properly evaluated.

James, who played in the NFL and was a Pro Bowler in 1985 for the New England Patriots, spent several years as a college football analyst at ESPN. He left his job to pursue the U.S. Senate in his home state of Texas. James finished a distant fourth in the Republican primary, with only four percent of the vote.

ESPN said it would not bring James back.