McKenna West’s emergency plea to the U.S. Supreme Court has been turned down, leaving custody of the baby she carried with his biological parents.
Justice Elena Kagan rejected the Alaska nurse’s bid for the nation’s highest court to review the custody arrangement. The decision keeps the infant with California couple Nausheen Gilkar and Omar Ahmed, who have named him Rumi. West, 30, has continued calling him Gabriel throughout the multi-state legal fight.
West had agreed to carry a child for Gilkar and Ahmed, but the arrangement collapsed after doctors diagnosed the fetus with hypoplastic left heart syndrome, a serious congenital defect. The couple sought to terminate the pregnancy based on medical consultations. West refused and traveled to Texas, where abortion is banned in nearly all circumstances.
She delivered the baby in Texas on Aug. 12, two weeks early, and he immediately needed specialized care for HLHS. The infant has since undergone major heart surgery while courts in multiple states weighed who would make decisions about his treatment and where he would live.
West has publicly defended her refusal to end the pregnancy. “I knew that I didn’t want to have to go through [an abortion],” she said in a previous statement. “I didn’t want for this baby – for his life to be cut short.”
She has also framed her custody challenge as advocacy for the child’s medical needs. “I’m not fighting to try to take someone else’s baby,” West wrote about the dispute. “I’m fighting because this baby boy needs someone willing to advocate for and fight alongside him as he gets the ongoing treatment his fragile heart requires. And it turns out that someone is me.”
Gilkar and Ahmed have consistently denied that they would block their son from receiving medical care. A California court had already recognized them as Rumi’s legal parents before West escalated her challenge to the federal level.
Their attorney, Adam Wolf, said after the Supreme Court decision: “We are grateful that Rumi can continue receiving the treatment he needs to survive, and that he will not be stripped away from his parents, who are ensuring their child receives top-notch medical care.”
He added: “Ms. West’s legal filings across three states, numerous courts of appeals, and now the U.S. Supreme Court have sought to undermine Rumi’s parents’ right to provide him with the care he needs. Those efforts have been rejected by every single court.”
The Texas Supreme Court had earlier permitted Rumi to be transferred from a Texas hospital to one in Los Angeles, ruling that “sustaining the life of the medically fragile child is the paramount concern in this time-sensitive matter.” That ruling had already moved the infant closer to his parents’ home state before the federal rejection of West’s appeal.
The case has drawn attention for crossing three states and multiple court systems, with West filing challenges in Alaska, Texas, and California before reaching Washington. Each court has sided with the biological parents’ custody rights.
West’s journey to Texas to carry the pregnancy to term placed her in one of the most restrictive abortion jurisdictions in the country, while the biological parents remained in California, where abortion access is protected. The geographic split intensified the legal complexity as different state courts asserted jurisdiction over various aspects of the dispute.
The Supreme Court’s refusal to hear the case marks the apparent end of West’s legal options to gain custody or decision-making authority over the child she birthed. No further appeals have been indicated.
Gilkar and Ahmed continue caring for Rumi in Los Angeles as he receives ongoing cardiac treatment following his surgery.