Q: Do parental rights termination affect child support obligations?

A: I understand how emotionally complicated it can be to feel disconnected from your children while still having legal and financial obligations. In New York, terminating parental rights does not automatically eliminate child support obligations unless the court specifically orders otherwise in very limited circumstances.

Generally, parental rights can only be terminated through a court proceeding, and in New York, this most commonly occurs in cases involving abuse, neglect, abandonment, or where an adoption is taking place. A parent cannot voluntarily relinquish their rights simply to avoid paying child support. Even if a parent wishes to give up their rights, the court will only grant termination if it is in the best interests of the child—typically in connection with a stepparent adoption or another arrangement that ensures the child’s continued support and care.

If your parental rights were terminated involuntarily or you are seeking to terminate them voluntarily, the obligation to pay child support typically continues unless the child is legally adopted by another person. For example, if your child is adopted by a stepparent and the court terminates your parental rights in connection with that adoption, your support obligation would generally end as of the date of adoption. However, any unpaid child support that accrued prior to that point would still be owed and enforceable.

Because you mention that you already have a court order in place for child support, and there is no current agreement or adoption proceeding, you remain legally obligated to pay child support regardless of the amount of contact you’ve had with your children. The law views child support as the child’s right, not something that can be waived or forfeited by the parent.

If your financial situation has changed or if you believe the current support order should be adjusted, you can petition the court for a modification of your child support obligation. You will need to demonstrate a substantial change in circumstances, such as a significant change in income or employment status.

This response is for general informational purposes only and does not constitute legal advice. For personalized guidance, please consult a qualified family law attorney licensed in New York.

A: New York has no termination of parental rights (TPR) except in two instances: there is a child abuse proceeding that results in a TPR and adoption to another set of parents, or a voluntary adoption where there is a ready, willing, and able replacement parent. Otherwise, the asker remains the child's parent.

However, none of this in any addresses the asker's primary concern. How is it he must pay a possibly unaffordable child support amount and not be able to have an influence in the upbringing of his child? The answer is a government nobody wants.

This writer has frequently been criticized for bringing politics into his legal advice. However, politics is family and family is politics. The difference between freedom and autocracy is that in freedom, we the people write the law that suits us through elected representatives, and that law must be equally applied to all litigants in a court. In an autocracy, the will of a single leader, or a single group of leaders, writes all the law they want to implement, and we must follow it at all costs. Judges come down hard on violators, usually the young father. Another example of an autocracy is our voting for elected representatives whose drives and ambitions are totally unknown to us voters. We do that predictably in every election.

Child support is a prime and recent example of autocratic law enacted by representatives whose drives were unknown to us. The child support system and its enforcement completely separates the man's obligation to pay support to the mother, but eliminates the mother's obligation to share the child. Additionally, the government creates the formula applied to the incomes of the parents to derive a dollar amount that will support the child. The parents do not decide, but rather government decides how many dollars will "support" the child. Government can impute income making the support obligation financially punitive against the man. Appellate courts can craft creative ways to maximize orders of support, or to broaden the population and circumstances subject to its effects.

As for enforcement, child support non-payment can lead to incarceration in New York as in all states. This is a trick to scare the father to pay his obligation to the mother. Mother never faces any incarceration. It is the enforcement of these orders the bring in federal money as matching funds. This flow has not yet been analyzed by DOGE, but it must be so analyzed. Child support can be used to flummox a young father's access to his child (jail, unaffordability to visit), and gives the young mother a procedural advantage in getting custody of the child because child support prioritizes the mother over the father and comes first in line of litigation: first support, then custody in separate proceedings.

Hence, the asker is caught between a system that combines and confuses freedom with autocracy. This confusion causes the ridiculous operation of child support that includes income imputations and incarceration separate from being able to see one's child. The father would have to file a separate family court petition for visitation, and that guarantees the young mother custody setting the child off into a single parent household where child protective case workers will be watching along with mandated reporters of child abuse. That is another federally funded legal process with the judge's hand on the spigot that flows federal money to the state.

A: You can not voluntarily terminate your parental rights. Your obligation for child support continues regardless of your relationship with the child, unless you can show parental alienation or emancipation. Termination of parental rights only exists by court order either in an adoption or neglect proceeding.

A: Giving up your parental rights does not automatically relieve you of your obligation to pay child support. In most cases, even if you voluntarily terminate your rights, the court can still enforce the child support order because it is a separate legal obligation meant to ensure your children’s well-being. Parental rights termination usually affects things like custody and visitation, but not financial support unless another legal decision is made regarding the support order.

If you want to stop paying child support, you would need to request a modification of the order through the court. The court will review your case and determine if a change to your child support obligations is appropriate, especially considering the lack of contact and involvement with your children.

It is important to act through the legal system to make sure any modifications to your support obligations are formalized. Until then, you will likely remain responsible for paying child support regardless of your parental rights status.