Milo Yiannopoulos, the British far-right provocateur and former Yeezy executive, has been taken into custody by U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement in Louisiana and is awaiting deportation.
ICE arrested Yiannopoulos on Thursday at the Louis Armstrong New Orleans International Airport, according to a statement from a Department of Homeland Security spokesperson, who referred to him as an “illegal alien from the United Kingdom” who legally entered the U.S. in 2019 but then “chose to overstay his welcome in violation of our nation’s laws.”
According to the agency, an immigration judge issued Yiannopoulos a final order of removal on July 22 after he did not show up to his immigration hearing. The statement said the Trump administration is “working diligently to ensure that aliens in our country illegally can no longer fly unless it is out of our country to self-deport.”
Immediate attempts to reach a representative for Yiannopoulos were unsuccessful.
Yiannopoulos was born in England and became a highly controversial figure in American politics, starting during Donald Trump’s rise in 2016, when Yiannopoulos worked as an editor for Stephen K. Bannon’s Breitbart.
While Yiannopoulos emerged as a leader in the alt-right movement, he was never accepted as a mainstream conservative figure, given his frequent misogynistic comments, associations with white supremacists and antisemites, and a history of other controversial remarks, such as saying a romantic relationship between a 13-year-old boy and an adult could be consensual — the latter costing him book and speaking opportunities.
In recent years he largely faded from conversation on the right, despite seeking to rebrand as an “ex-gay” and working as an unpaid intern for then-Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene (R-Georgia).
His support for Trump has ebbed over the years, and he’s recently been critical of the president. In December, Yiannopoulos appeared as a guest on Tucker Carlson’s show; Carlson also planned to publish a book by Yiannopoulos on his new imprint.
Last year, Yiannopoulos appeared on a podcast hosted by Candace Owens — another Trump supporter turned critic — who has been in a feud with influential MAGA blogger Laura Loomer.
Loomer told The Washington Post that since 2024 she has repeatedly contacted ICE, DHS more broadly and the FBI about Yiannopoulos. She said she reported him to the FBI after he made threatening social media posts calling for violence against her.
In an interview, Loomer took credit for Yiannopoulos’s detention, saying it was “100 percent” because she raised attention to his immigration status. “Who else reported that Milo was an illegal alien?” she said.
DHS did not immediately respond to Loomer’s comments.
Yiannopoulos also worked as chief of staff for Yeezy, the company owned by rapper Kanye West, known as Ye. Yiannopoulos claimed responsibility for inviting white supremacist Nick Fuentes to a 2022 dinner with Ye and Trump — a move that generated blowback for Trump, who had just announced his 2024 presidential campaign. Yiannopoulos later told NBC News he did it “just to make Trump’s life miserable.”
Yiannopoulos, who resigned from Yeezy in 2024, saying it was because of the rapper’s reported move into adult entertainment. He was then sued, along with Ye, by a group of eight employees claiming a hostile work environment; Yiannopoulos has denied the claims.
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