But it’s the provision of the law that allows compensation to a surrogate beyond strictly medical and other pregnancy-related expenses that has gotten the law’s opponents (mainly Christians) whipped into a frenzy. What supporters see as Washington State allowing what is already legal in other states, including nearby California, religious right groups see as monetizing wombs and legalizing so-called baby-selling. Some have even gone so far as to say the law encourages child trafficking.

These opponents, including the groups Them Before Us and the related Family Policy Institute of Washington, consider the practice of surrogacy as the buying and selling of babies, believing that no child should be separated from their “biological” parent—even though many babies carried by surrogates are biologically related to one or both of their legal parents.