Jens Spahn, a senior German conservative politician and ally of Chancellor Friedrich Merz, resigned as parliamentary group leader of the Christian Democratic Union (CDU) on Saturday after facing accusations of hypocrisy over his use of a surrogate mother in the United States to have a child.
Spahn, 46, who served as health minister until 2021, announced earlier this week that he and his husband, Daniel Funke, had become parents. The couple used a surrogate mother in the US because surrogacy is banned in Germany under the 1990 Embryo Protection Act, which punishes the practice with up to three years in prison or a fine. While raising a child born to a surrogate abroad is not illegal, the policy has long been backed by Spahn’s party and by Spahn himself.
“Jens Spahn resigned as CDU parliamentary leader after using a surrogate mother, a practice he once condemned.”
In 2015, Spahn wrote: “As a gay man and a Christian I find it personally very hard to warm to the idea of a rented womb.” As health minister in 2020, he rejected calls by the liberal FDP to relax the ban. Just four months before his child was born, the CDU voted at a party conference in February to reaffirm its opposition to surrogacy.
The announcement of his fatherhood immediately drew criticism from within his own party. Marion Rosin, a CDU member in Thuringia, told the BBC: “Politicians who set standards for others must be measured by them too. If that credibility is gone, resignation is a matter of consequence.” Daniel Peters, the CDU leader in Mecklenburg-Western Pomerania, told Bild newspaper that Spahn was “no longer tenable as chair of the parliamentary group” and called his behaviour “completely unacceptable”.
Initially, Spahn sought to defend himself, telling Bild he had “wrestled with myself for a long time, including on the issue of surrogacy” before deciding to go ahead. But the pressure mounted. On Friday, Merz announced the controversy would be discussed at the party’s next executive committee meeting; several German media outlets reported that the chancellor had asked Spahn to quit.
In his resignation letter, obtained by German media, Spahn wrote: “Over the past few days, I’ve realised that my personal happiness in starting a family with my husband and becoming a father is incompatible with my political office.” He added that the “balancing act” between his private decision and the expectations of his role “became greater than I anticipated”. He also cited the “increasing relentlessness in public discourse” as giving him “deep pause for thought”.
Merz described Spahn’s resignation as “right and inevitable”, writing on social media: “Credibility is the highest asset in politics.” He said he would begin the process of appointing a successor. German media reported that Alexander Hoffmann, head of the Christian Social Union parliamentary group, would take over Spahn’s duties in the interim. Hoffmann said: “Jens Spahn’s decision deserves the utmost respect.”
Spahn, a prominent voice on the CDU’s right flank who has pushed for a harder line on immigration, had survived other political scandals. But this one proved too damaging. The controversy came at a difficult time for Merz, who is struggling in opinion polls ahead of key regional elections this autumn, and risked further weakening the party’s standing.
