Alex Okrent ’05 passed away Friday morning after collapsing at the Obama campaign headquarters in Chicago, where he worked.  The 29-year-old alumnus of the College of Social Studies (CSS) was Paid Media and Polling Regional Director for the 2012 presidential campaign, and has worked for Obama ever since his 2004 senate campaign.

Fox Chicago reported that Okrent had been working out at the gym earlier that morning, as he did every day, before coming into work at the campaign headquarters in the Prudential Center.  A report by the local ABC News affiliate adds that he told a friend he was talking to online that he wasn’t feeling well, collapsing when he went to take an aspirin.  He was treated on-site by paramedics before being taken to Northwestern Memorial Hospital, where he was pronounced dead shortly after.  A massive heart attack may have been to blame, Okrent’s family believes.