{"id":39790,"date":"2026-08-12T02:03:38","date_gmt":"2026-08-11T21:03:38","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/usnews-14267fa.ingress-comporellon.ewp.live\/?p=39790"},"modified":"2026-08-12T02:03:38","modified_gmt":"2026-08-11T21:03:38","slug":"ken-paxton-steps-into-heated-surrogate-abortion-battle-baby-gabriel-deserves-a-chance","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/usnews-14267fa.ingress-comporellon.ewp.live\/?p=39790","title":{"rendered":"Ken Paxton Steps Into Heated Surrogate Abortion Battle: \u2018Baby Gabriel Deserves a Chance\u2019"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><script>\r\n  atOptions = {\r\n    'key' : '644b717812d811d6a1c1fc5b6ccd6fa6',\r\n    'format' : 'iframe',\r\n    'height' : 90,\r\n    'width' : 728,\r\n    'params' : {}\r\n  };\r\n<\/script>\r\n<script src=\"https:\/\/www.highperformanceformat.com\/644b717812d811d6a1c1fc5b6ccd6fa6\/invoke.js\"><\/script>\r\n<br \/>\n<\/p>\n<div id=\"attachment_5504406\" class=\"wp-caption alignnone\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" aria-describedby=\"caption-attachment-5504406\" class=\"size-full wp-image-5504406\" src=\"https:\/\/am11.mediaite.com\/med\/cnt\/uploads\/2023\/12\/AP23343564026058-scaled.jpg\" alt=\"Ken Paxton\" width=\"2560\" height=\"1706\" \/><\/p>\n<p id=\"caption-attachment-5504406\" class=\"wp-caption-text\">AP Photo\/Eric Gay, File<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<p>Texas Attorney General <strong>Ken Paxton<\/strong> (R) has stepped into a heated abortion battle between biological parents and a surrogate from Alaska.<\/p>\n<p>On Tuesday, Paxton&#8217;s office announced he had &#8220;intervened in a Dallas County parentage case to protect the life of an unborn child who is expected to be born imminently with a serious but treatable heart condition.&#8221;<\/p>\n<div class=\"embed_container\" id=\"eda2396dc57a04937924b2b36731b236\">\n<blockquote class=\"twitter-tweet\" data-width=\"500\" data-dnt=\"true\">\n<p lang=\"en\" dir=\"ltr\">BREAKING: I am fighting to save an unborn child diagnosed with a treatable heart condition and am demanding that Dallas hospitals provide life-saving care. <a href=\"https:\/\/t.co\/GWjEzRqYrk\">pic.twitter.com\/GWjEzRqYrk<\/a><\/p>\n<p>&mdash; Attorney General Ken Paxton (@KenPaxtonTX) <a href=\"https:\/\/x.com\/KenPaxtonTX\/status\/2087170031415333329?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw\">August 11, 2026<\/a><\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n<\/div>\n<p>&#8220;BREAKING: I am fighting to save an unborn child diagnosed with a treatable heart condition and am demanding that Dallas hospitals provide life-saving care,&#8221; Paxton <a href=\"https:\/\/x.com\/KenPaxtonTX\/status\/2087170031415333329\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">wrote on X<\/a>. Paxton is currenlty the Republican <a href=\"https:\/\/www.mediaite.com\/politics\/just-in-nate-silver-reveals-his-updated-midterm-election-forecast-rates-texas-as-lean-d\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">nominee<\/a> for U.S. Senate in the state.<\/p>\n<p>The fetus at the heart of the debate is known as <strong>Baby Gabriel<\/strong>. He was diagnosed with Hypoplastic Left Heart Syndrome (HLHS), a congenital condition in which &#8220;the left side of the heart does not form correctly during pregnancy,&#8221; which means &#8220;the left side of the heart cannot pump oxygen-rich blood to the body properly,&#8221; per <a href=\"https:\/\/www.cdc.gov\/heart-defects\/about\/hypoplastic-left-heart-syndrome.html\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">the CDC<\/a>. Infants born with HLHS need surgery &#8220;soon after birth.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p>The biological parents, <strong>Nausheen Gilkar<\/strong> and <strong>Omar Ahmed<\/strong>, met surrogate<strong> McKenna West<\/strong>, through Worldwide Surrogacy Specialists, LLC. The trio signed an agreement in Alaska, and West &#8220;agreed to the intended parents\u2019 parental rights that recognize that they will make choices relating to the fetus,&#8221; <a href=\"https:\/\/www.texastribune.org\/2026\/08\/11\/texas-surrogate-ken-paxton-abortion-baby-gabriel\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\"><em>The Texas Tribune<\/em><\/a> reported Tuesday.<\/p>\n<p>After receiving the diagnosis at 20 weeks gestation, Gilkar and Ahmed reportedly asked West to undergo an abortion. She refused. Paxton&#8217;s filing also indicates Gilkar and Ahmed do not wish for the fetus to undergo surgery or treatment upon birth.<\/p>\n<p><em>The Texas Tribune<\/em> also reported Gilkar and Ahmed &#8220;want to bring the child back to California after the child is born so they can make treatment decisions under their state\u2019s law.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p>Texas law allows the state to make decisions for a newborn child, even if those decisions override what parents have requested.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;Baby Gabriel deserves a chance at life, and I will not allow anyone to unlawfully deny him medically necessary care,&#8221; Paxton wrote in the filing. &#8220;My office will use every tool available to protect innocent lives and ensure that every child receives the care required under Texas law.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p>The post <a href=\"https:\/\/www.mediaite.com\/media\/news\/ken-paxton-steps-into-heated-surrogate-abortion-battle-baby-gabriel-deserves-a-chance\/\">Ken Paxton Steps Into Heated Surrogate Abortion Battle: \u2018Baby Gabriel Deserves a Chance\u2019<\/a> first appeared on <a href=\"https:\/\/www.mediaite.com\">Mediaite<\/a>.<\/p>\n<p><script async src=\"https:\/\/platform.twitter.com\/widgets.js\" charset=\"utf-8\"><\/script><br \/>\n<br \/><script async=\"async\" data-cfasync=\"false\" src=\"https:\/\/pl30214220.effectivecpmnetwork.com\/9ab3d4df8a7e1a6171e16ddbf732cc19\/invoke.js\"><\/script>\r\n<div id=\"container-9ab3d4df8a7e1a6171e16ddbf732cc19\"><\/div>\r\n<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>AP Photo\/Eric Gay, File Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton (R) has stepped into a heated abortion battle between biological parents and a surrogate from Alaska. On Tuesday, Paxton&#8217;s office announced he had &#8220;intervened in a Dallas County parentage case to protect the life of an unborn child who is expected to be born imminently with&#8230;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":39791,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"fifu_image_url":"https:\/\/am11.mediaite.com\/med\/cnt\/uploads\/2023\/12\/AP23343564026058-scaled.jpg","fifu_image_alt":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[19],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-39790","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-newsweek-trending"],"brizy_media":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/usnews-14267fa.ingress-comporellon.ewp.live\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/39790","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/usnews-14267fa.ingress-comporellon.ewp.live\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/usnews-14267fa.ingress-comporellon.ewp.live\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/usnews-14267fa.ingress-comporellon.ewp.live\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/usnews-14267fa.ingress-comporellon.ewp.live\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=39790"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/usnews-14267fa.ingress-comporellon.ewp.live\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/39790\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/usnews-14267fa.ingress-comporellon.ewp.live\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/39791"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/usnews-14267fa.ingress-comporellon.ewp.live\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=39790"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/usnews-14267fa.ingress-comporellon.ewp.live\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=39790"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/usnews-14267fa.ingress-comporellon.ewp.live\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=39790"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}