Surrogate asks Texas court to let her seek medical care on the baby she’s carrying, AG Paxton saysby Sneha Dey, Katlyn Ma and Terri Langford, The Texas Tribune
August 11, 2026
Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton has intervened to support an Alaskan surrogate who traveled to Texas to get court approval to treat the baby she is carrying for a severe heart defect once a California couple denied the procedure.
Paxton’s office secured an emergency order on Tuesday to support the surrogate McKenna West, who is asking in a family district court in Dallas County to allow the child to remain in Texas and to get treatment. The court order stops anyone from refusing any necessary treatment and from removing the child from Texas while the court considers the case.
His office has also sent a letter to UT Southwestern Medical Center and Children’s Medical Center of Dallas to remind them that they are legally obligated to provide medically necessary care to the child.
“Baby Gabriel deserves a chance at life, and I will not allow anyone to unlawfully deny him medically necessary care,” Paxton said in a news release.
West, a nurse, entered a surrogacy agreement in Alaska, where she lives, with the intended parents, Nausheen Gilkar and Omar Ahmed, through Worldwide Surrogacy Specialists, LLC, a Connecticut-based surrogacy agency. Typically under gestational agreements like the one that West signed with Gilkar and Ahmed, the intended parents, not the surrogate, have the parental rights to make choices relating to the fetus.
The fetus West is carrying was diagnosed with hypoplastic left heart syndrome at 20 weeks of pregnancy, and Gilkar and Ahmed allegedly asked her to undergo an abortion and they have said they will refuse to let the baby undergo treatment after he is born, according to Paxton’s Monday filing.
West has since traveled to Texas and has asked the Dallas court to recognize her parental right as the birth mother to intervene in medical treatment for the baby. There’s also a pending parentage court case in California, but the details of it are not clear. While Paxton’s legal filing says the intended parents have refused to consent to surgery, it also says the intended parents want to bring the child back to California after the child is born so they can make treatment decisions under their state’s law.
West, Gilkar, Ahmed and their lawyers have not responded to requests for comment.
West is seeking legal protection in Texas because the state’s family law recognizes anyone who gives birth in Texas as the legal mother of that child, said Rachel Rebouché, University of Texas School of Law professor who specializes in reproductive law.
"What the AG is asking the court to say is that Texas has jurisdiction, because she's the birth mother, and that's the default rule," Rebouché said.
The exception to that Texas law is if the Dallas judge agrees with the legal contract signed in Alaska recognizing Gilkar and Ahmed’s right to make the call on the baby’s medical treatment.
"If the intended parents decided that they didn't want their child to have surgery at birth, for whatever reason, like, painful disability, you know .... they have that right. They have the right to deny treatment," she said.
But another Texas law could work against Gilkar and Ahmed — the state can override a parent’s medical decision for a child when it determines intervention is necessary to protect the child’s welfare, according to Paxton’s legal filing.
Paxton’s letter to the hospitals challenges the fundamental purpose of gestational agreements by arguing that it cannot transfer power to any adult — even their parents — to refuse a child’s treatment. “A gestational agreement cannot enlarge parental authority beyond what Texas law permits,” Paxton said. It also says that in an emergency, a physician can provide life-sustaining treatment without a parent’s permission.
According to Paxton’s office, the active legal disputes argue who speaks for the fetus but they do not determine what life saving treatment must be provided to the child.
Anti-abortion group, Texas Alliance for Life applauded Paxton’s move. “We are proud to live in a state where the sanctity of human life is recognized,” Amy O’Donnell, executive director of the group said.
Texas has long been considered a surrogacy friendly state. Since 2003, state law has allowed intended parents in surrogacy arrangements to be recognized as a child’s legal parents before birth. Last year, Texas recorded 657 births through surrogacy, according to the Texas Department of State Health Services. But the practice has drawn scrutiny in recent months from the state Republican party whose 2026 platform called for limitations on commercial surrogacy and a ban on third-party egg and sperm donations.
Sneha Dey contributed to this story.
Disclosure: UT Southwestern Medical Center has been a financial supporter of The Texas Tribune, a nonprofit, nonpartisan news organization that is funded in part by donations from members, foundations and corporate sponsors. Financial supporters play no role in The Texas Tribune's journalism. Find a complete list of them here.
This article first appeared on The Texas Tribune.
