Robin Armstrong

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Robin Armstrong (born 1969) is a Dickinson, Texas, medical doctor who is the new vice chairman of the Republican Party of Texas. Armstrong was elected at the state convention held in San Antonio on June 3, 2006, to succeed the term-limited David Barton of Aledo in Parker County. He defeated Internet grassroots organzer, Bobby Eberle of Pearland. He will serve a two-year term with current chairman Tina Benkiser, an attorney from Houston. Under Texas law, each major party must at all times have a woman as either chairman or vice chairman.

At their convention, Texas Republicans affirmed their opposition to affirmative action in their state platform and then chose Armstrong, who is black, as vice chairman.

Armstrong was born in Texas City and reared in nearby La Marque in Galveston County. He has a bachelor's degree in microbiology from Texas A&M University in College Station and a medical degree from the University of Texas Medical Branch in Galveston. He did his residency in internal medicine. He is on the staff of Mainland Medical Center in Texas City, which is located down the street from his boyhood home. He is also the 2006 president of the Galveston County Medical Society.

He graduated from La Marque High School. He was a wide receiver on the Cougars football team that played in the 5A state championship in 1987; he also ran the 800 meters and the two-mile relay in track and field.

Armstrong affirms his faith in Jesus Christ. He says that he became a Christian during his sophomore year at Texas A&M. He has traveled on two missionary journeys to Africa and on a third to Nicaragua. Armstrong has worked in inner city and youth ministry at his church, the Abundant Life Christian Center in La Marque, where he leads a men’s Bible study group. He opposes abortion.

Armstrong has been active in the grassroots of the GOP, as a city chair, an election judge, a precinct chair, a poll watcher, a convention delegate, a Senatorial District Convention chairman, and most recently as the State Republican Executive committeeman for Texas Senate District 11, which covers parts of Galveston, Harris, and Brazoria counties. He is a member of the Galveston Pachyderm Club and the Texas Eagle Forum (a conservative group founded by Phyllis Schlafly of St. Louis).

He was reared in a political household. His father, Robert Armstrong, was a member of the La Marque Independent School Board. Armstrong said that he will try to halt the United States from "drifting away from the values that made her great." According to Armstrong, the GOP must "expand our conservative base to maintain our party’s success in the future. It is not enough to preach to the choir; we must continue to grow by reaching out to people of faith, professional groups, and minorities who have been abandoned by liberalism." Armstrong said that he will work closely with Benkiser to win the "cultural war" and to secure GOP majorities into the future.

Dr. Armstrong and his wife Martha, who is also a medical doctor, have two sons, Daniel and Gabriel.