An Intended Parent’s Nightmare: The Legal Fight Over Surrogacy, Abortion, and Baby Rumi

A California couple is facing every intended parent’s worst fears: a serious congenital birth defect, a surrogacy agreement allegedly breached, their parentage and legal rights to their child questioned by their own surrogate, and litigation in different states to decide one complicated question: what do surrogacy laws allow intended parents to do for their children?

Families who have used surrogacy to grow their own families may recognize where the situation starts. The California-based intended parents, Nausheen Gilkar and Omar Ahmed (the “intended parents”), struggled with infertility for years and underwent eight rounds of in vitro fertilization (IVF) transfers before the intended mother underwent a hysterectomy. The intended parents decided to pursue surrogacy to conceive and worked with an agency, Worldwide Surrogacy Specialists, LLC, to meet their Alaska-based gestational carrier, McKenna West (the “surrogate”). The intended parents and the surrogate negotiated and executed a surrogacy agreement together in August 2025.

Surrogacy agreements can vary across states and individual circumstances. However, they usually include provisions that the surrogate will not be a legal parent to the child; that the intended parents will be the child’s legal parents and will appear on the child’s birth certificate; that the intended parents will have sole authority to name the child; and, that any decision to terminate or abort the pregnancy will be made after discussion with the surrogate, the intended parents, and the parties’ treating physicians.

At a 20-week anatomy scan, prenatal testing revealed that the fetus had hypoplastic left heart syndrome (HLHS): a serious congenital heart defect which requires critical surgery shortly after birth, two more surgeries during childhood, and is likely to cause lifelong complications or require a heart transplant. It is uncontested that the intended parents and the surrogate all initially agreed to terminate the pregnancy.

Shortly after, however, the surrogate stopped all communication with the intended parents and contacted conservative legal organizations, including Alliance Defending Freedom (ADL) and Live Action. ADL is a conservative Christian legal advocacy group and was a key participant in overturning Roe v. Wade; Live Action is an anti-abortion activist organization that paid for the surrogate and her children to fly to Texas, where terminating the pregnancy would be unlawful.

In the meantime, the intended parents obtained a pre-birth order in California, establishing them as the baby’s legal parents. The intended parents began making arrangements for the child to be born in California; however, the surrogate instead began treatment at Children’s Medical Center of Dallas, against the intended parents’ wishes. Before the baby was born, Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton intervened and filed a motion in Texas, seeking an order for “doctors to perform surgery after the child’s birth” and to prevent the intended parents from refusing to provide “lifesaving care.”

While the motion was granted, the Texas court also held that the surrogate could not make any medical decisions for the baby or hold herself out as the baby’s parent or guardian to hospital staff. The intended parents’ attorney, Lee Budner, blasted Paxton’s actions. “As if the heartbreak of [their child’s] condition were not enough, [the intended parents] are devastated to see their family tragedy transformed into political theater by the Texas Attorney General’s office and [the surrogate],” Budner wrote in a public statement. “Our clients’ only focus at this time is ensuring that their baby receives the medical care that he vitally needs and that they, as his parents, are able to spend every precious moment they can with their beautiful newborn son.”

The intended parents’ baby, Rumi, was born on August 12, 2026, and immediately underwent the Norwood procedure, “a complex palliative heart surgery.” In a hearing on August 25, 2026, the intended mother sobbed on the witness stand, testifying that “[h]e’s the most beautiful person I’ve ever seen… He’s the love of our lives. He’s suffering a lot.” She continued, “he’s our child…she’s trying to take him from us.” Budner said in a statement, “[Rumi’s] condition remains critical and complex, and his family seeks privacy in caring for their son on his long road to recovery.” At this time, Rumi is in critical condition.

Meanwhile, the surrogate, who has ignored the baby’s name and called him “Gabriel” publicly and in the media, sought sole conservatorship to make all medical decisions for the child. One of the surrogate’s attorneys, Lincoln Davis Wilson, said that the surrogate would challenge the parentage orders, including the California pre-birth order, “because we think that Texas law makes a woman who gives birth [to] a child, the mother of the child.” The surrogate’s claim to conservatorship was recently denied by the Texas court, which granted full faith and credit to the intended parents’ California pre-birth order, and she was “dismissed with prejudice from the Texas proceedings.” The surrogate responded by filing an emergency appeal to the United States Supreme Court, seeking control over Rumi’s medical care while she continues pursuing custody of the intended parents’ baby. (The Supreme Court is unlikely to intervene in a family law dispute and is not obligated to hear the case.)

There is no silver lining here. But, these situations are an important reminder of the importance of surrogacy laws and of the legal aspects of family building. Surrogacy is legal in the United States but is not federally regulated. Instead, states promulgate their own laws, leading to patchwork protections and gaps subject to interpretation. Rachel Rebouché, a University of Texas School of Law professor specializing in reproductive law, said that these disputes between intended parents and surrogates are rare. Surrogacy agreements will usually include terms for deciding on medical care issues or terminating pregnancies, but Rebouché said that these terms “are aspirational, not enforceable in court.” Maya Shulman, Esq., owner of Shulman Family Law Group and an adjunct professor at the University of West Los Angeles (UWLA) School of Law, said she rarely sees cases like this. Shulman said that contracts are important in surrogacy agreements to establish that “a surrogate is not a parent.” Surrogacy agreements – much like known donor agreements, intended parent agreements, and other assisted reproduction contracts – are important because of their ability to recognize intended parents and the joys, sorrows, privileges, and rights that being a parent brings.