Former KY lawmaker is the uncle of Minnesota school shooter
A former Kentucky lawmaker is the uncle of a mass shooter who killed two children in a shooting at a Minneapolis Catholic school Wednesday morning.
Bob Heleringer, a longtime Louisville member of the Kentucky House of Representatives, is the uncle of Robin Westman, 23, who opened fire at the church of Annunciation Catholic School.
Westman shot and killed two children and injured 17 others. Westman died of a self-inflicted gunshot wound in the church parking lot.
Heleringer said he barely knew Westman, according to the Associated Press. Heleringer watched the tragedy unfold in news coverage.
“I wish he had shot me instead of innocent schoolchildren,” Heleringer told the AP.
Westman is the youngest child of Heleringer’s sister, Mary Grace Westman, he confirmed. He told the AP he last saw Westman at a family wedding several years ago but has not had contact since then.
Mary Grace Westman, 67, previously lived in Lexington in 2013, according to online court records.
Heleringer represented the 33rd District, including Louisville and surrounding counties, as a Republican from 1980 to 2003.
“I barely knew him,” Heleringer told TV station WLKY. “They (Robin’s family) never lived in Louisville. They lived in Minnesota.”
Robin was born Robert Westman, but Mary Grace Westman changed her child’s name in 2019 to reflect gender preference, according to Time Magazine.
Heleringer has published several opinion pieces since leaving office criticizing his fellow Republicans for what he described as “anti-gay/transgender bigotry.”
He was outspoken against Kentucky’s Senate Bill 150, passed in 2023, which banned gender-affirming health care for transgender youth. He advocated against that bill and others on behalf of the Fairness Campaign, a Kentucky-based LGBTQ rights organization.
Heleringer called one such bill — a precursor to the eventual SB 150 — the most “despicable” bill he’d seen in 45 years.
“You’re doing it because you can. You don’t like certain groups of people,” he told lawmakers at a committee meeting. “They puzzle you. You don’t understand them; you haven’t tried to understand them. And yet they are people that walk and live in your district.”
Gov. Andy Beshear addressed the Minnesota shooting Thursday afternoon during a Team Kentucky update and said all children should feel safe going to school.
“Every American child should feel safe when they go to school,” Beshear said. “And no parent should have to go through the pain and suffering from these parents and so many like them have faced. As a dad, it’s hard to comprehend. As a person who lost one of his best friends in these shootings, it’s hard every time they happen.”
This story was originally published August 28, 2025 at 12:12 PM.
