Former GOP presidential candidate Herman Cain dies after battle with coronavirus – CNBC

Herman Cain, a worn presidential hopeful who became once regarded as by President Donald Trump for the Federal Reserve, has died after being hospitalized with the coronavirus. He became 74.

Cain’s dying became announced Thursday on his web space by Dan Calabrese, who edits the positioning and had previously written about his colleague’s diagnosis.

“Herman Cain – our boss, our buddy, esteem a father to so many folks – has passed away,” Calabrese acknowledged within the blog post. “All of us prayed so laborious daily. We knew the time would arrive when the Lord would call him home, however we no doubt beloved having him right here with us, and we held out hope he’d contain a corpulent recovery.”

Cain became among the highest-profile public figures within the US to contain died from Covid-19. Less than two weeks sooner than receiving his diagnosis, Cain attended Trump’s advertising campaign rally in Tulsa, Oklahoma, which had been staged regardless of concerns about mass gatherings at some level of the pandemic.

Cain, a stage 4 most cancers survivor, tweeted a photograph of himself at Trump’s rally showing him surrounded by other attendees, none of whom regarded as if it could perchance most likely perchance be carrying masks or other conserving equipment.

A July 2 observation from Cain’s social media accounts asserting his hospitalization acknowledged, “There’ll not be this kind of thing as a ability of luminous for obvious how or where Mr. Cain contracted the coronavirus.” The Trump advertising campaign acknowledged after Cain’s diagnosis that he had now not met with the president on the Tulsa rally.

The advertising campaign acknowledged that all attendees on the occasion had their temperatures checked upon entry, and that masks and hand sanitizer had been handed out however now not required to make remark of. Before the occasion, the advertising campaign published that six participants of the crew alive to on the rally preparations had examined sure for the virus and had been quarantined.

Cain had been hospitalized in Atlanta on July 1, two days after being told he had examined sure for Covid-19, primarily based on his social media.

He did now not require a respirator and became “unsleeping and alert” when he checked in to the sanatorium, the observation acknowledged. “Please join with us in praying for Mr. Cain, and for everyone who has contracted the coronavirus – as nicely as their families,” it acknowledged.

Cain had been a enterprise executive and board chairman of a branch of Kansas Metropolis’s Federal Reserve Financial institution sooner than entering into Republican politics and at final turning correct into a presidential candidate.

Final 300 and sixty five days, Trump in transient regarded as picking Cain as his nominee to affix the Federal Reserve Board. Cain remained a vocal supporter of Trump’s after his nomination became withdrawn.

A worn CEO of the restaurant chain Godfather’s Pizza, Cain grew to was a player in Republican politics as an financial handbook to Bob Dole’s 1996 presidential advertising campaign sooner than in transient launching his dangle say in 2000.

Within the 2012 GOP presidential significant season, Cain gained outsized media coverage with his catchy “9-9-9” financial procedure to substitute worthy of the federal tax code with a 9% enterprise transactions tax, a 9% non-public profits tax and a 9% sales tax. Critics called the procedure “dubious” and impractical.

Sen. Mitt Romney of Utah, who would clinch the GOP nomination in 2012, tweeted Thursday that he became saddened to listen to of Cain’s passing.

Cain suspended that advertising campaign in December 2011 following loads of allegations of sexual harassment, ranging encourage to his time as chief executive of the Nationwide Restaurant Association within the 1990s. Cain denied the allegations.

After his hospitalization, Cain’s social media accounts each so many times provided imprecise updates on his situation. A message on July 5 acknowledged he became “making growth” and that “extra encouraging files” became anticipated to realize encourage quickly. Two days later, Cain’s Twitter myth acknowledged “medical doctors strive to be obvious his oxygen ranges are factual.”

On July 10, some other tweet acknowledged Cain himself described his region as “cruise regulate,” attributable to “the growth is gradual however his respiratory is getting stronger daily. Gain no mistake: He is bettering!”

The most most popular update came Monday, when Cain’s social media published that he became “being treated with oxygen for his lungs” practically a month after entering the sanatorium. “He truly is bettering, which system it is working,” the update acknowledged.

Calabrese many times declined CNBC’s requests for additional data on Cain’s situation for the length of his fight with the virus.

“We’re now not pronouncing the relaxation beyond what we now contain posted on social media,” Calabrese acknowledged in a July 7 electronic mail. “That’s Herman’s and Gloria’s wish so I like you respecting it.”

Along with to his wife Gloria Etchison, survivors contain his two younger folks, Melanie and Vincent, Calabrese acknowledged.

— CNBC’s Marty Steinberg contributed to this file.