A California couple's surrogacy arrangement has morphed into a high-stakes custody fight in Texas, with both the biological mother and the surrogate claiming the right to parent a critically ill newborn. Nausheen Gilkar and Omar Ahmed, who used their own embryo and a surrogate after infertility and a hysterectomy, say a California court already named them the legal parents, per the New York Times. Their surrogate, Alaska nurse McKenna West, fled to Texas and carried the pregnancy to term after refusing their request—a request that was allowed under their contract—to end the pregnancy when a severe heart defect was detected.
West now argues she should have custody because she defied the abortion request and ensured the baby's birth. "He is here and he has a birthday because of the fight I have put up," she said in court testimony. Meanwhile, Gilkar wept in court as she described her own ordeal, reports the New York Post. "She's making us run from doctor to doctor, state to state. ... She's trying to take him," Gilkar said, adding, per the Times: "She's unstable."
As for the baby, Gilkar noted, per the AP: "He's the most beautiful person I've never seen. He's the love of our lives. He's suffering a lot." The two-week-old boy, named Rumi by the couple, remains in critical care, per the Times. A Dallas judge on Tuesday extended a restraining order blocking West from presenting herself as the baby's parent while the case is weighed. The fight has drawn in Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton and anti-abortion advocacy group Alliance Defending Freedom, turning a private surrogacy dispute into a test of how abortion, surrogacy contracts, and interstate court orders collide.
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