Herman Cain, who attended Trump's rally in Tulsa, hospitalized with COVID-19

Herman Cain
(Image credit: Eric Thayer/Getty Images)

Former Republican presidential candidate Herman Cain has been hospitalized after testing positive for COVID-19.

A statement posted to Cain's Twitter account on Thursday confirmed the news, saying he tested positive for the coronavirus on Monday and that he "developed symptoms serious enough that he required hospitalization" by Wednesday.

"He spent the past night in the hospital and as of Today, Thursday, July 2, he is resting comfortably in an Atlanta-area hospital," the statement said. "Mr. Cain did not require a respirator, and he is awake and alert."

Subscribe to The Week

Escape your echo chamber. Get the facts behind the news, plus analysis from multiple perspectives.

SUBSCRIBE & SAVE
https://cdn.mos.cms.futurecdn.net/flexiimages/jacafc5zvs1692883516.jpg

Sign up for The Week's Free Newsletters

From our morning news briefing to a weekly Good News Newsletter, get the best of The Week delivered directly to your inbox.

From our morning news briefing to a weekly Good News Newsletter, get the best of The Week delivered directly to your inbox.

Sign up

Cain attended President Trump's recent rally in Tulsa, Oklahoma on June 20, and he posted a photo of himself at the event not wearing a face mask. He was at the rally as a Trump campaign surrogate, but he didn't travel to Tulsa on the campaign's plane, CBS News' Nicole Sganga reports. The campaign said in a statement on Thursday that Cain "did not meet with the president."

See more

"There is no way of knowing for sure how or where Mr. Cain contracted the coronavirus," the statement released on Cain's Twitter account said. An editor of Cain's website wrote that "we honestly have no idea where he contracted it," adding, "I realize people will speculate about the Tulsa rally, but Herman did a lot of traveling the past week, including to Arizona where cases are spiking."

Trump received criticism for holding his rally amid the coronavirus pandemic, and prior to the event, six Trump campaign staffers tested positive for COVID-19. Another two campaign staffers later tested positive as well.

Continue reading for free

We hope you're enjoying The Week's refreshingly open-minded journalism.

Subscribed to The Week? Register your account with the same email as your subscription.

Brendan Morrow

Brendan is a staff writer at The Week. A graduate of Hofstra University with a degree in journalism, he also writes about horror films for Bloody Disgusting and has previously contributed to The Cheat Sheet, Heavy, WhatCulture, and more. He lives in New York City surrounded by Star Wars posters.