{"id":57129,"date":"2026-07-18T14:53:09","date_gmt":"2026-07-18T14:53:09","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/germany\/57129\/"},"modified":"2026-07-18T14:53:09","modified_gmt":"2026-07-18T14:53:09","slug":"top-german-conservative-quits-after-surrogacy-sparks-backlash-within-party-government-news","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/germany\/57129\/","title":{"rendered":"Top German conservative quits after surrogacy sparks backlash within party | Government News"},"content":{"rendered":"

German conservative leader says becoming a father through a surrogate is \u2018incompatible\u2019 with his office.<\/p>\n

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Published On 18 Jul 202618 Jul 2026<\/p>\n

A high-ranking politician in Germany\u2019s governing conservative coalition has resigned from his position after having a baby through a surrogate mother, a move at odds with his own party.<\/p>\n

Jens Spahn, 46, the parliamentary leader of Chancellor Friedrich Merz\u2019s Christian Democrat party and its sister Christian \u200cSocial Union (CDU\/CSU), stepped down from his role on Saturday after calls from within his own party for him to quit.<\/p>\n

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News that Spahn and his husband had become parents through a surrogate in the United States broke on Thursday, leading to criticism from his fellow conservatives and accusations of hypocrisy from the opposition.<\/p>\n

\u201cOver the past few days, I have come to realise that my personal happiness \u2013 starting a family with my husband and becoming a father \u2013 is incompatible with my political office,\u201d Spahn wrote in his resignation letter to party colleagues.<\/p>\n

His exit strips Merz of one of his closest allies.<\/p>\n

As parliamentary leader of the Christian Democrats, Spahn\u2019s job was to make sure Merz\u2019s government had the votes to pass its agenda, making it one of the most powerful roles in German politics.<\/p>\n

The practice of surrogacy is banned in Germany, though it is legal for prospective parents to raise a child born to a surrogate abroad.<\/p>\n

Spahn\u2019s party voted to sustain the ban as recently as February.<\/p>\n

Spahn defended himself before German media on Friday, telling the Bild newspaper he had \u201cwrestled with myself for a long time, including on the issue of surrogacy\u201d.<\/p>\n

Merz said that Spahn\u2019s decision to step down was \u201cright and unavoidable\u201d.<\/p>\n

While crediting Spahn with helping the CDU return to power, he added, \u201cCredibility is the most valuable asset in politics.\u201d<\/p>\n

The chancellor avoided publicly criticising his ally, but said he saw \u201cno reason\u201d to change his party\u2019s stance on surrogacy and said the CDU would discuss the incident.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"German conservative leader says becoming a father through a surrogate is \u2018incompatible\u2019 with his office. Published On 18…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":57130,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[151,5,1235,42,358,481,7856],"class_list":["post-57129","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-germany","tag-europe","tag-germany","tag-government","tag-news","tag-politics","tag-united-states","tag-us-canada"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/germany\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/57129","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/germany\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/germany\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/germany\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/germany\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=57129"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/germany\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/57129\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/germany\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/57130"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/germany\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=57129"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/germany\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=57129"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/germany\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=57129"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}