Spahn had become a prominent voice on the CDU's right-wing flank, pushing for a harder line on immigration
A prominent figure in German Chancellor Friedrich Merz’s centre-right party resigned his leadership post Saturday, party sources told AFP, amid controversy over his use of a surrogate mother in the US despite a ban on the practice in Germany.
“In recent days, I have come to realise that my personal happiness in starting a family with my husband and becoming a father is incompatible with my political office,” Jens Spahn, the chairman of the CDU’s faction in parliament, wrote in a letter to colleagues that was obtained by AFP.
Spahn and Merz’s CDU party is vehemently opposed to surrogate pregnancies, having most recently voted to maintain Germany’s ban at a party congress in February.
Spahn and his husband recently became parents to a child by using a surrogate mother in the United States.
