ATLANTA - Herman Cain suspended his presidential campaign Saturday at the pre-scheduled opening of a new campaign headquarters here.

These false and unproved allegations continue to be spinned in the media and in the court of public opinion so as to create a cloud of doubt over me and this campaign and my family.”

The decision from the former Godfather's Pizza CEO and one-time GOP poll leader comes after a week of reassessment of his prospects, despite public defiance on the campaign trail.

But to a crowd that came to cheer on their support at what was to be an opening day party — and rarely felt like anything else than a fervid campaign rally — Cain acknowledged the toll on his family and his campaign from a month of revelations of multiple sexual harassment allegations and a claim of an extramarital affair.

Cain said that despite his decision, he had no plans to pull back from the public sphere.

“I am not going to be silenced, and I am not going away,” Cain declared, unveiling a “Plan B” that will include speaking out, a new website and an endorsement of one of his former rivals.

Plan A, he said, was to win the White House and change Washington from the inside, but “Plan B is that we are going to have to change it from the outside.”

“I am disappointed that it came to this point, that we had to make this decision,” he said.

Cain returned to his McDonough, Ga. home Friday for the first time since Ginger White said Monday that they'd had a 13-year sexual relationship. He'd said he was traveling back there to see his wife face-to-face for the first time since White told her story and decide with her how to proceed with a campaign that has plummeted in the polls.

For much of the week, Cain kept up a campaign schedule that took him to Ohio, Michigan, New Hampshire and South Carolina, but was repeatedly dogged at the events and in interviews by the questions about the affair. He told the Union Leader Thursday that he had given White money without telling his wife, but maintained that there was nothing improper about the relationship.

But as recently as Friday in Rock Hill, S.C., his final campaign event before returning to Georgia, Cain said he was “reassessing because of all of this media firestorm stuff.”

“Why? Because my wife and my family come first,” he said.

Cain's campaign has been ensconced in controversy since an October POLITICO report that two women claimed Cain sexually harassed them while he was at the head of the National Restaurant Association. A third woman, in an Associated Press report, accused Cain of inappropriate behavior, but never filed a complaint against him. And, flanked by super lawyer Gloria Allred at a high-profile news conference, Sharon Bialek said Cain pushed her to perform a sex act in exchange for help obtaining a job.

Cain has repeatedly said he is innocent, and called the claims of all the women “totally baseless.” His campaign launched a website, caintruth.com, as part of an aggressive pushback against the charges, to discredit the accusations.

Juana Summers is a reporter for POLITICO. The New Hampshire Union Leader and POLITICO are sharing content for the 2012 presidential campaign cycle.

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More to follow as this story unfolds here and tomorrow in print editions of the New Hampshire Sunday News.

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