Kyle Rittenhouse lands in hospital after venomous spider bite

Kyle Rittenhouse, who gained notoriety in 2020 for shooting three people at a civil rights rally in Wisconsin, said he was hospitalized on May 6 after a venomous spider bit him.

In a post on X, the 23-year-old said a brown recluse, a spider commonly found in the south-central and midwestern United States, was the culprit for his injury. Rittenhouse also posted pictures of himself in a hospital bed as well as a close-up shot of the spider's bite mark.

“The communists couldn't take me out and I'll be damned if I let a brown recluse take me out,” he posted. "Disappointed I’m not Spider-Man now…"

Now recovering, Rittenhouse did not say when the spider attack happened. The post drew thousands of responses full of both support and mockery. 

Among the thousands who responded was Sen. Rand Paul, R-Kentucky, who was one of the first to wish Rittenhouse well, saying, “you got this.”

“Thank you, Senator,” Rittenhouse responded on X.

What did Kyle Rittenhouse do?

In 2020, at the age of 17, Rittenhouse took an AR-15-style rifle to a Black Lives Matter demonstration in Kenosha, Wisconsin, and fired it, killing two people and injuring a third. Rittenhouse said he pulled the trigger in self-defense and was acquitted of wrongdoing.

He fatally shot Joseph Rosenbaum and Anthony Huber and wounded Gaige Grosskreutz. At the time, he faced charges ranging from intentional homicide to reckless endangerment. 

Rittenhouse has since penned a book, "Acquitted," and in early 2024, he set out on a series of Turning Point USA-sponsored college speaking events dubbed the "Rittenhouse Recap." The speaking engagements focused on "the importance of the Second Amendment and the lies of (the Black Lives Matter movement)," according to the organizers, per USA TODAY's previous reporting.

USA TODAY’s Jay Stahl contributed to this report.

Fernando Cervantes Jr. is a trending news reporter for USA TODAY. Reach him at [email protected] and follow him on X @fern_cerv_.