Abortion Refusal Sparks Interstate War

A Texas surrogate says her newborn was pulled from her care within a minute of birth, and now a bitter custody fight is playing out after she refused a demand to abort him over a heart defect.

Quick Take

Surrogate McKenna West refused to abort baby Gabriel after doctors found a severe heart defect.
Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton stepped in and won an emergency order guaranteeing the baby lifesaving care.
A restraining order now blocks West from seeing Gabriel or making his medical decisions.
A California court had already named intended parents Nausheen Gilkar and Omar Ahmed the legal parents before birth.
The clash between California and Texas parentage law is now headed toward the Texas Supreme Court.

Surrogate Refuses Abortion Request Over Heart Defect

McKenna West, a surrogate from Alaska, was carrying a baby for California couple Nausheen Gilkar and Omar Ahmed under a gestational agreement. When doctors diagnosed the unborn baby with a rare and serious heart defect, the intended parents asked West to end the pregnancy. She refused, and instead flew to Texas late in her pregnancy to seek medical care and legal protection for the child she named Gabriel.

West’s decision set off a legal firestorm. Under most surrogacy contracts, intended parents, not the surrogate, hold the right to make medical decisions about the pregnancy. West argued that once she landed in Texas, the state’s own parentage laws gave her standing to protect the baby and demand treatment for him after birth.

Texas Attorney General Steps In To Protect The Baby

Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton’s office intervened on August 11, filing an emergency motion in a Dallas County family court. A judge ordered UT Southwestern Medical Center and Children’s Medical Center of Dallas to provide the baby with lifesaving treatment once born, and barred anyone from blocking that care or moving him out of state. Paxton called it a fight to save the child’s life.

Gabriel was born August 12 in the Dallas area with a serious heart condition, one day after Paxton’s office secured the order. Texas Alliance for Life praised the attorney general’s “swift action,” saying he protected a disabled baby from being aborted against his mother’s wishes. For pro-life Americans, the case became a rallying point almost overnight.

Custody Battle Erupts After Birth

The relief over the birth did not last long. Within roughly a day, Gilkar and Ahmed’s attorney announced the biological parents had taken physical custody of the baby while he received treatment at a specialized hospital. A judge then issued a temporary restraining order barring West from making any medical decisions for Gabriel and from seeing him.

West is now fighting that order in court, insisting Texas law makes her the child’s legal mother because she gave birth there. Her attorney, Lincoln Wilson, put it bluntly: “She is seeking parentage of the child because she gave birth in Texas, and in Texas, if you give birth to a child, it’s your child”. Gabriel has since undergone heart surgery while the legal fight continues.

Competing State Laws Collide In Court

The case hinges on a clash between two states’ parentage rules. A California court had already ruled Gilkar and Ahmed the baby’s legal parents before he was even born, based on their gestational agreement with West. Texas law generally says the mother-child relationship is established simply by giving birth, unless a gestational agreement has been properly validated by a Texas court ahead of time.

𝐂𝐎𝐔𝐏𝐋𝐄 𝐖𝐇𝐎 𝐃𝐄𝐌𝐀𝐍𝐃𝐄𝐃 𝐀𝐁𝐎𝐑𝐓𝐈𝐎𝐍 𝐍𝐎𝐖 𝐒𝐔𝐄𝐒 𝐒𝐔𝐑𝐑𝐎𝐆𝐀𝐓𝐄 𝐖𝐇𝐎 𝐑𝐄𝐅𝐔𝐒𝐄𝐃 𝐓𝐎 𝐊!𝐋𝐋 𝐓𝐇𝐄𝐈𝐑 𝐒𝐎𝐍

Nausheen Gilkar and Omar Ahmed paid surrogate McKenna West $60,000 to carry their son — then demanded she abort him after doctors… pic.twitter.com/3x5knUOe3z

— M.A. Rothman (@MichaelARothman) August 20, 2026

Wilson argues the California order should carry no weight in Texas because it was never validated under Texas’s own surrogacy statute. “We think that once that California judgment is removed… she is” the recognized parent, Wilson has argued in filings tied to the case. Gilkar and Ahmed’s side maintains the pre-birth agreement already settled the matter.

Case Heads Toward Texas Supreme Court

With lower courts split on how to weigh the competing orders, the dispute is now being pushed toward the Texas Supreme Court for a final answer on parentage. Until then, the temporary restraining order stands, keeping custody and medical authority with Gilkar and Ahmed while West is shut out of decisions for the baby she carried and refused to abort.

For conservatives watching, the case underscores what happens when disability becomes grounds for an abortion demand, and why state protections for surrogates and vulnerable children matter. Paxton’s intervention gave Gabriel a chance at treatment. Now, a Texas courtroom will decide whether the woman who fought for that chance has any legal claim to the son she calls Gabriel.