But he also didn’t want to talk politics while his job was to cover sports.

“The direction of the country over the last six months … it really impacted my decision on what I want to be talking about every day,” he told Colin Cowherd on “The Herd” podcast.

And so Cain made the jump back to politics, leaving ESPN for Fox News’ “Fox & Friends Weekend,” five years after leaving the politics forum for sports. At ESPN, he hosted a daily radio show and appeared frequently on “First Take.” He was a conservative voice on a network known for left-leaning viewpoints. He didn’t hide it.

“Let me be honest with you about my biases, my beliefs,” Cain said. “I don’t want to hide them from you and in response I want to hear yours … the biggest mistake we can make is to box people out — tell them, ‘You’re wrong, you’re racist, you don’t belong in the conversation.’ That’s not what I wanted to do, I want to be honest about who I was and invite everybody else to tell me how I was wrong.”