David Armstrong

David Bruce Armstrong (born October 3, 1961) is an American businessman and Republican politician from Barron County, Wisconsin. He is a member of the Wisconsin State Assembly, representing Wisconsin's 67th Assembly district since 2025; he previously represented the 75th Assembly district from 2021 to 2025. Earlier, he served as a member of the city council of Rice Lake, Wisconsin.

Early career Armstrong was active in the substance abuse testing industry, working as a vice president at Healthcomp Evaluation Services Corporation and then ClinNet Solutions. The latter was acquired by ADP in 2004. Armstrong's autobiographical website further states that he was the founder of two other health-related companies earlier in his career, both of which were acquired. Within days, Armstrong announced he would be a candidate for the Republican nomination to replace Quinn in the 75th assembly district. Armstrong did not face an opponent in the Republican primary and went on to face Democrat John C. Ellenson, a former Wisconsin Badgers basketball player, in the November general election.

Armstrong ran into significant controversy in September 2020 when a review of his Twitter feed found that he had been posting and retweeting messages from the QAnon conspiracy theory. When asked about it, Armstrong did not disavow the conspiracy and instead said that he finds the core claims "interesting" but not necessarily credible though this view was misreported. A further review found what the Democratic Party of Wisconsin described as years of racism, misogyny, religious bigotry, and conspiracy theories in his feed. In the days just after the 2015 Charleston church shooting, he posted a series of supposedly racist tweets, including one featuring a snippet of Ku Klux Klan leader David Duke. Armstrong was also apparently outraged by subsequent bipartisan vote in Congress to ban the Confederate flag, as he then promised to stop donating to the Republican Party as punishment for their act. The tweets and Facebook posts were compiled by the Democratic Party of Wisconsin in an attack webpage, called The Real Dave Armstrong. Despite the controversy, Armstrong won the election with 62.33% of the vote—a higher percentage that his predecessor had achieved in the 2018 election.

On Wednesday, June 22, 2022, Governor Evers’ called for a Special Session to defend reproductive rights in Wisconsin to introduce and pass AB 713 and AB 106, which would have protected the right for women to have a say over their bodies. Despite the fact that there is a bipartisan support for legal access to abortion from both Wisconsin Democrats and Republicans, David Armstrong and other Republicans in the Legislature gaveled in and gaveled out at the special session without protecting women's rights and leaving 1.3 million Wisconsin women of reproductive age without rights to their own bodies.

Personal life and family Dave Armstrong and his wife Janell reside in Rice Lake, Wisconsin. They have four adult children and several grandchildren.

Wisconsin Assembly, 67th district (2024)