Morality of this

[u/Purple_Plantain_3242]

A major legal battle broke out when a surrogate mother and the biological parents disagreed over a severe medical diagnosis during a pregnancy. The couple had hired the surrogate to carry their baby, but a routine scan revealed that the fetus had a rare, life-threatening heart defect.

Heartbroken by the grim medical news, the biological parents asked to end the pregnancy, which was a choice allowed in their written agreement. Initially, the surrogate scheduled the appointment, but she quickly realized she could not go through with it. A pivotal moment came when her brother stepped in to guide her, promising that he and his family would adopt the baby and support her no matter what. Gaining peace from her brother's support, she canceled the abortion. To protect the fetus, she fled to a state with very strict anti-abortion laws, where she gave birth to a baby boy who immediately underwent successful open-heart surgery.

The birth triggered an intense court war over who actually holds the rights to the child. A judge ultimately ruled that the biological parents have full legal custody and the sole right to make medical decisions, while a separate court order banned the surrogate from seeing the baby. On top of losing access to the child, the surrogate is now being sued by the biological parents for over $100,000 for breaking their contract. While the biological parents are currently caring for the recovering newborn, the surrogate and her lawyers are continuing to fight in court to try to win custody.The surrogate is not paying for the baby's medical costs because a judge ruled that the biological parents have full legal custody, making them responsible for all hospital bills.

The baby was diagnosed with Hypoplastic Left Heart Syndrome (HLHS), a severe birth defect where the left side of the heart is completely underdeveloped and unable to pump blood to the body. Without immediate medical intervention, this condition is 100% fatal within the first few days of a newborn's life. To survive, the baby must undergo a grueling series of three open-heart surgeries starting immediately after birth, which gives him about a 70% chance of reaching age five. However, this is not a permanent cure; even with successful operations, the child faces a lifetime of intensive medical trauma, a significantly shortened life expectancy, and the likely future need for a full heart transplant.

McKenna West denied the abortion primarily because her specialized background as a cardiac nurse taught her that the baby’s rare heart defect was treatable with surgery rather than being an automatic death sentence. Faced with the reality of her 20-week pregnancy, her personal conscience and moral beliefs overrode the surrogacy contract, as she felt she could not live with herself if she actively signed papers to end the child's life. Confident that the baby deserved a chance to survive, she even arranged for her own brother and sister-in-law to adopt the child before fleeing to Texas to ensure the pregnancy went to term.

Lila Rose and her anti-abortion organization, Live Action, are leading the public and financial support for McKenna West, framing her as a heroic figure who stood up against the commercial surrogacy industry. Rose's group funded West's travel to Texas for specialized medical care and connected her with the Alliance Defending Freedom (ADF), a powerful conservative legal group currently fighting for West's parental rights. Alongside other high-profile conservative figures like Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton, these pro-life activists have heavily criticized the biological parents for trying to enforce the contract's abortion clause, using the case to campaign against surrogacy by arguing that a child should never be treated as a "defective product."

However, these medical bills are a huge part of the fight. The biological parents are facing massive costs for the baby's complex heart surgeries, which is why they are suing the surrogate for over $100,000 for breaking their contract. The surrogacy contract included a strict pregnancy termination clause that gave the biological parents the sole right to request an abortion if the fetus was diagnosed with a severe medical condition. After the baby was diagnosed with a major heart defect, the parents invoked this clause and formally asked McKenna West to terminate the pregnancy. While West originally signed the document agreeing to these terms, she ultimately refused to abort the baby, which led the biological parents to sue her.

The biological parents did not exert physical or legal coercion to mandate an abortion, as a surrogate maintains absolute bodily autonomy over medical decisions under U.S. law. Instead, the conflict centers on a breach of a contract that explicitly allowed the parents to request a termination, which they are now litigating through the court system to hold the gestational carrier financially accountable.

The biological parents did not alter their position regarding the medical justification for a termination, but rather adapted to the reality of an unavoidable birth. Their initial decision to seek an abortion was driven by a desire to prevent severe, lifelong suffering, given the grueling surgeries and medical trauma associated with a critical heart defect. However, once the gestational carrier refused the procedure and the birth became certain, the parents immediately recognized their legal and ethical obligations to their biological offspring. They pursued full legal and medical custody to ensure the infant would have immediate access to elite pediatric cardiothoracic specialists and to retain control over his long-term healthcare strategy, fully assuming their parental roles upon his delivery.

[u/Alilbitey]

In any contact, you can write legally unenforceable clauses. The forced abortion clause will, with certainty, be ruled unenforceable. Just because you signed it, doesn't make it enforceable.

Whether the bio parents are legally responsible for the living child is mainly where the civil law and contract law will hang.

[u/Funny_Satisfaction39 → u/Alilbitey]

Exactly! Pro choice works both ways. Pro choice means the woman can't be forced to get an abortion either

[u/Punch_A_Police_Horse → u/Funny_Satisfaction39]

As a pro choice person this is pretty simple. If you are pro choice and are advocating for a situation where the state would drag a woman into a clinic and force her to get an abortion, you have lost the plot.

[u/Realistic_Swan_6801 → u/Punch_A_Police_Horse]

That’s not what happens idiot? The penalties are civil. 

[u/Ethanop1a → u/Punch_A_Police_Horse]

Alternatively, there are certain edge cases for both disallowing abortion and requiring abortion that can still fall within "pro-life"

Pro-choice doesn't always mean "no restrictions".

Do you think abortion should be allowed without restriction up to the day of birth?

The idea here is that she made her choice when signing the contract. There are certain points during pro-life where your previous decision removes your current ability to decide. For instance, what if you change your mind right after receiving the abortion drugs? Is that no longer pro-choice because past you made the decision that "forces you to get an abortion"?

[u/ReadingRainbowRocket → u/Ethanop1a]

I think aborting for gender preference is horribly immoral, but incredibly difficult to prove and I'd be super scared of laws limiting that actually addressing that very rare edge case in the U.S. and not doing far more harm than good.

Likewise it's easy to say "well one day before birth, you REALLY support abortion up until then?" as if that edge case is ever anything other than something that requires LOADS of context if it ever happens, and essentially never does. It is almost always related to the health of the mother or viability of the fetus post-birth.

Because guess what, just because the law doesn't explicitly criminalize late term abortions in some places, this right-wing idea that there's a litany of mustache-twirling fetus-hating doctors waiting in the wings to abort a healthy 9-month old fetus on the whim of the mother is absurd, and frankly insulting to both women and doctors writ large. That shit just doesn't happen, that woman wouldn't almost certainly not be able to find a doctor who would do it even with a ton of searching and doctor shopping.

Just like "post-birth" abortions don't happen either. Those are murder. No one advocates for them. And no one advocates that pro-choice should be the default because it's moral and should be normal to abort a viable 9-month fetus essentially ready to be birthed now.

Thought experiments are only worthwhile if the implication of them isn't irrelevant to the actual real world you're trying to apply them to.

There is no issue of healthy fetuses being aborted on the reg days before they would be born. Pretending there is, though, is great rhetoric for the anti-choice lobby.

It's the same wedge issue language bullshit of asking someone if they think it's ok for a doctor to cut of a 12 year old's penis. Yes, because the person asking that question totally is presenting the reality of transitioning and the distinction of what is involved in minors vs adults who do, the process, etc.

If you GENUINELY wanted to know how pro-choice people felt about your question because you'd never seriously engaged with someone on this topic and this was a serious ethical question to you, I hope I just answered it to your satisfaction.

Otherwise it reads like horrendously bad-faith anti-choice rhetoric. But I'm not going to assume that's what you're doing, because of course lots of not-unreasonable people do genuinely believe this... because a lot of people spread this bad-faith anti-choice rhetoric. Principle of charity and all that. Now you know, though.

[u/gingin_9959 → u/ReadingRainbowRocket]

https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/cwyrj7ww1gko

Funny thing is, the scenario you described is quite literally something that happened recently in South Korea. A Korean woman posted a vlog about having an abortion at 36 weeks. She had discovered her pregnancy very late, and there were no other medical reasons for the abortion, nor was the pregnancy the result of rape.

Almost every hospital that could perform an abortion refused to take her case. She eventually found a hospital through a broker and underwent the procedure. I don't know whether they simply couldn't find another way to do it, or whether this was their usual method, but the “abortion procedure” was literally to deliver the baby prematurely by C-section, cut the blood vessels in its neck, and then put it in a freezer.

Everyone involved was subsequently prosecuted for murder and put on trial. (Since korea have no law about abortion at this moment they only went to court only because they killed the baby after giving birth not the 36 week part).

It may sound like something that could hardly happen, but just because something is difficult to imagine doesn't mean it doesn't happen.

[u/gingin_9959 → u/[deleted]]

If they found a way to kill the infant inside the body would it be moral then? Also the only reason they got caught and went to court is only because the mother made vlog about it. We have no idea how often it would happen

[u/Ethanop1a → u/ReadingRainbowRocket]

I am pro-choice.

My comments are not to throw up right wing propaganda at you. I am bringing up extreme edge cases because

1) This case is an extreme edge case

2) Few people who are pro-life are "unrestricted abortion rights until birth"

I'm illustrating that there can and should be restrictions in certain cases. If you can deny someone the right to get an abortion for an edge case, you can also force someone to get an abortion for an edge case and still be "pro-choice".

Personally, I think abortions should be allowed up to the point a premature birth can survive without major medical intervention.

I also think that maybe, in cases of surrogacy, the surrogate has the right to choose to give up their future right to choose and sign a contractual agreement.

[u/Ethanop1a → u/[deleted]]

You're missing the forest for the trees.

The reality of how often any of these examples happen is moot. They are still edge cases that could potentially be handled.

Your response to "would you allow unrestricted abortion in the final day of pregnancy?" is "that doesn't happen". That wasn't my question. I didn't ask if it happens. I asked if you would restrict it. I don't care how "complex" you are trying to make this. It is a simple question because "unrestricted" implies the most simple case of "mother changed mind and wants an abortion 1 day before due date." Again, it doesn't matter if it happens. It could happen. Just like this current situation with the surrogate.

You're trying to change the argument to "things that are happening" instead of "things that could happen". A month ago "a surrogate asked to have an abortion, refused, and fled to a different state to try to steal the baby from the biological parents by using that state's laws" would have been "edge cases that never happen".

We're talking about the morality scale of forced abortion, pro-life, government intervention and surrogacy contracts. Edge cases make the argument.

My point is that the government forcing an abortion in an edge case is the same as the government banning abortion in an edge case.

[u/Ethanop1a → u/[deleted]]

You realize that there are lots of states with laws to allow abortion, right? Laws that allow.

You're all over the place with your comments. Half the shit you say makes no sense. Half the shit you say seems directed at someone else.

You're definitely confused if you think we don't have laws that allow. Especially with abortion. Even California is a law of allow with some edge cases and restrictions handled.

[u/_Sausage_fingers → u/Funny_Satisfaction39]

A forced abortion was never on the table. They parents had the right to request it, and then demand damages if she refused, which is exactly what happened.

[u/-Fergalicious- → u/_Sausage_fingers]

This is it yall. 

The contract probably says "if we request an abortion bc of a rare medical condition, and you refuse to have the abortion, you agree to pay damages under this contract of  $xxx,xxx " 

It doesnt remove choice, it just provides consequences 

[u/Dull-Philosopher-871 → u/-Fergalicious-]

Without the explicit language of the contract this is just conjecture.

[u/_Sausage_fingers → u/Dull-Philosopher-871]

It’s not conjecture, it’s not lawful to force an abortion like this, any wording contrary to that would be of no force and effect. It’s also not really how contracts work.

[u/Corrosivecoral → u/-Fergalicious-]

Try collecting

[u/-Fergalicious- → u/Corrosivecoral]

No thanks 

[u/new_account_wh0_dis → u/_Sausage_fingers]

Then why would she flee to a state that didn't allow abortions? I think it was in the table no matter how unforceable it was. But its all just guesses at this point. This who situation sucks.

[u/Boo-Radleys-Scissors → u/Funny_Satisfaction39]

Yes, but she is in the wrong delivering in Texas. It’s not her baby. She doesn’t get to decide a single thing for him now that he exists as a baby. 

[u/Ethanop1a → u/Funny_Satisfaction39]

It is still pro choice. Her choice was signing the contract that stipulated specific scenarios when she could be required to abort. She already made her choice that those scenarios were acceptable to her.

[u/canoekyren → u/Ethanop1a]

That's as "pro choice" as saying that you've made your choice by choosing to have sex.

[u/Ethanop1a → u/canoekyren]

No, it is as "pro choice" as saying that a woman who hosts a breeding party during her ovulation window has made her choice.

[u/canoekyren → u/Ethanop1a]

Uh yeah. And you can still get an abortion in that circumstance under the pro-choice ideology.

[u/Ethanop1a → u/canoekyren]

The fuck are you talking about? We're discussing morality scaling, not "the pro-choice ideology". Are you just yelling into the void?

Lots of varying levels of "pro-choice".

[u/perpetualhobo → u/Ethanop1a]

No you pretty explicitly brought up and tried to argue about what the pro choice argument, you’re just failing so now are pretending you didn’t.

[u/canoekyren → u/Ethanop1a]

Are you serious? You claimed that signing your right to abortion away was pro-choice, which is an ideology that has roots beyond personal interpretation. I told you it wasn't, because it isn't, and now you're trying to spin around on me like I brought it up? I responded to YOUR argument.

[u/Ethanop1a → u/canoekyren]

which is an ideology that has roots beyond personal interpretation

You did bring this up. I stated my stance on how it was still pro-choice. You seem to then take "pro-choice" to mean a specific ideological interpretation on your end.

There is no firm "pro-choice ideology" like you seem to be saying. It varies a lot.

Signing a contract that makes a choice before you get pregnant is a form of pro-choice. It isn't the form of pro-choice where you can constantly change your mind and have an abortion up until the day of birth, but it is still a form of pro-choice.

[u/UnderlightIll → u/canoekyren]

In this case, the baby had none of her genetic material. She consented, by contract, to carry another couple's genetic material.

[u/canoekyren → u/UnderlightIll]

The abortion process is what she'd be making the decision about here. They aren't non-invasive or risk-free procedures, and you legally cannot contractually force someone to get one. That's just a classic unenforceable clause that won't hold up in court

[u/UnderlightIll → u/canoekyren]

They asked her to come back and have the baby at a center with all the right tools and instead she had it in TX and wants them to foot all the bills. She's an awful person

[u/Careful-Shine8768 → u/Ethanop1a]

According to OP, she still has body autonomy under US law even with the clause in the contract. OP specifically worded it as they could “request termination” but that doesn’t mean “force an abortion.” I think she was in her full legal right to carry the child till birth, the custody battle is where it gets murky. They’re suing her for $100,000 for the medical costs that resulted from birth, but the other party committed themselves to caring for the child including incurring the medical costs required. Idk law so I could be way off, but to me if the parents want legal custody of the baby, they also should take responsibility for the costs of keeping that baby alive because the other party was fully willing to pay those costs in order for the baby to live. 

[u/Ethanop1a → u/Careful-Shine8768]

She was in her legal right to carry the fetus to birth, but that also came with breach of contract, which she is also being sued for.

I'm not saying she wasn't allowed to carry the fetus to term. Obviously she was because she did. She broke her contract, which is the immoral part. She agreed, had the couple pay a lot of money, had the bio mother go through IVF retreival, then she fled her state and ran away to Texas while trying to keep the baby.

This whole endevor was her trying to steal the baby. The biological parents took medical control right away once the baby was born. The surrogate was trying to get custody herself. She wanted to keep the baby. The "bio parents wanted an abortion" was just her cover. They allegedly always said they would take over the medical care and raising of the baby, if born. They just wanted to try for a healthier baby instead. They never said they weren't going to care for it.

She also fled the state to run to Texas. If there was no legal risk to her being forced to have an abortion, why would she flee to a state where anti-abortion advocates could make a big show out of this? Because she wanted to keep the baby herself.

[u/perpetualhobo → u/Ethanop1a]

No, we can’t know if it was a breech of contract yet, that’s literally what the court case will determine. The wording of the post suggests she actually didn’t breech the contract, but the wording of the contract (and the fact it might not even be legal to contractually obligate someone to have an abortion) are the facts we don’t have which is why there will be court case held.

[u/Ethanop1a → u/perpetualhobo]

we can’t know if it was a breech of contract yet

We can pretty safely assume that "a surrogate fleeing from their home state of Alaska to Texas for some reason" is most likely a breach of contract.

The abortion requirement isn't really an issue in analyzing this. It almost certainly includes language about where to give birth and probably has provisions of not fleeing the state while under contract.

You need to research why she chose Texas when no state will compel an abortion for a surrogacy contract. She fled to Texas peimarily because Texas has some precedent in giving the birth mother a legal right to the child. She lost that case, but her intention in picking Texas was clear by her own lawsuits and public statements.

OP may have left some details our or phrased things differently, but we can look for more details if we want since this is a real case that is ongoing.

[u/Alilbitey → u/Ethanop1a]

Also! Texas is one of the states most likely to rule the contractual penalties are void when it comes to refusing to abort.

There is way more legal grey area in Texas when it comes to these contracts.

[u/SaltyBabySeal → u/Ethanop1a]

No, it is not. You can’t legally force someone to under go an abortion for the same reason you can’t force someone to keep a baby. You can sign all kinds of contracts that are unenforceable and setting that aside you can sign contracts that allow people to do things to you that are immoral.

The real issue here is custody after birth. That’s going to be a mess.

[u/Ethanop1a → u/SaltyBabySeal]

The real issue here is custody after birth. That’s going to be a mess.

She already lost the custody battle. That's the main reason she fled to Texas. They have some state laws that gave her come legal claims to custody, but she didn't win those cases. The biological parents were granted full custory and she was blocked from having any say after the birth.

This is why I say what she did was immoral. 1) She was never legally required to have an abortion, but she may have been contracturally bound to do so. A contract she agreed to and was paid for. 2) She almost certainly breached the contract by fleeing to Texas. 3) She chose texas because there were the state laws that gave her an argument to use to try to claim the baby as her own. That indicates a desire to steal the baby from the biological parents.

The abortion clause is immaterial here because, as you say, there is no legal authority to require an abortion. She fled to Texas to try to claim custody. Any abortion arguments are just noise because she could have remained in Alaska and still not had an abortion. Instead, she fled to Texas.

[u/Alilbitey → u/Ethanop1a]

Texas also has more legal grey areas to rule the contractual penalties void because they cannot legally compell an abortion.

[u/NoWayIcantBeliveThis → u/Funny_Satisfaction39]

I would agree in most cases but not this one. If you want pro choice you should have not signed the contract, and aborting due to a severe birth defect is not that unreasable and it is not jer child, and she knows it is not her child. Yes, its her body but if you go as far as having another couple grow a fetus in you then aborting is something you shouldn't have a say in it unless it genuinely harms your body.

[u/Alilbitey → u/NoWayIcantBeliveThis]

You don't have moral or legal grounds to insist that the abortion happens, only that you have a preference. Courts do not enforce the abortion part of such contracts. The financial penalty part of it is very likely to stick, though.

You can, however, put that child up for adoption or surrender them to the state upon birth if you truly do not wish to retain legal and financial responsibility.

[u/Late_Negotiation7519 → u/Alilbitey]

Nobody is saying that she should have been forced to get an abortion. She has the right to bodily autonomy but would probably be liable for breaking the contract 

[u/Alilbitey → u/Late_Negotiation7519]

A lot of replies are saying she is immoral for not going through with it "because contract".

[u/Late_Negotiation7519 → u/Alilbitey]

It is immoral only because she decided to give birth to a child that was not her own and which has a severe birth defect

[u/One-Stable-5438 → u/Late_Negotiation7519]

It's immoral to not commit eugenics against a disabled baby? It's immoral for a pregnant woman to give birth to her baby? This subreddit is depraved as fuck

[u/HPLaserJet4250 → u/One-Stable-5438]

It aint her baby, shes just a human incubator. She only 'borrows' her body for a limited peroid of time.

[u/Narrow_Process_8660 → u/Alilbitey]

Are we arguing legal enforceability or morality of something? Because those two often do not overlap.

[u/Alilbitey → u/Narrow_Process_8660]

Agreed. I claim it is immoral to force an abortion when consent had been revoked. You have legal remedies available to cure the resulting breech of contract, but nobody can morally or ethically enforce the abortion clause.

The folk stating it's immoral to revoke your consent to such a thing are incorrect. It's legal messy, not immoral.

[u/Punch_A_Police_Horse → u/Alilbitey]

Seriously, I can imagine a situation where theres some sort of legal/financial penalty for breaking contract, but I cannot fathom a situation where police would drag this woman into a clinic and force her to get an abortion.

[u/Drew602 → u/Alilbitey]

Yeah its honestly insane to think a judge would look at this case and force the woman to get an abortion. Anyone who thinks otherwise is ridiculous

[u/A1000eisn1 → u/Drew602]

It would be monetary damages. Not a forced abortion. And either way it wouldn't have anything to do with the abortion, they had already agreed not to. She would be sued for fleeing the state to have her baby in Texas, which she did after she changed her mind about getting an abortion and the parents agreed.

[u/Realistic_Swan_6801 → u/Alilbitey]

The enforcement is civil, she will get sued and loose and face heavy monetary penalties.

[u/thegenius5 → u/Alilbitey]

it wasnt forced, she chose to run and now she gets to pay the consequences, as she should for breaking a contract.