Kyle Rittenhouse said Wednesday that he was hospitalized after a venomous spider bite, posting photos from a hospital bed and of the apparent bite mark on his leg. In one post, Rittenhouse wrote, “The communists couldn’t take me out and i’ll be damned if I let a brown recluse take me out.”
He followed that with another line: “Disappointed I’m not Spider-Man now...” Rittenhouse did not say whether he killed the spider after the bite, and he did not give any other details about his condition.
The bite appears to have been serious enough to send the 23-year-old to the hospital, though brown recluse bites are not commonly fatal in adults. They can still be serious and require immediate medical attention.
Rittenhouse first became widely known after the 2020 Kenosha, Wisconsin, protest shooting case, when he traveled to an organized demonstration over the police shooting of Jacob Blake with an AR-15-style rifle to defend local businesses. The then-17-year-old killed two men and injured a third before being acquitted on all charges after arguing that he had acted in self-defense.
Since then, he has cultivated a following among American right-wingers centered on gun rights and Second Amendment politics. In January, Rittenhouse urged gun owners to “carry everywhere” after federal immigration agents in Minneapolis shot and killed 37-year-old VA ICU nurse Alex Pretti, then later wrote that “Communists are gay. And anti-2A people are gay. Biden’s failed open borders policies created this ENTIRE mess.” In December, he announced that he had married Bella Nelson Rittenhouse.
The hospital post adds another public flashpoint to a figure who already attracts attention whenever he comments online. This time, though, the only thing he says is trying to take him out is a brown recluse.
