Key takeaways:
- DHS said Milo Yiannopoulos legally entered the U.S. in May 2019 but overstayed and was ordered removed after missing a July 22 immigration hearing.
- Yiannopoulos was detained by ICE at Louis Armstrong New Orleans International Airport and deported Friday to the United Kingdom, according to U.S. officials cited by multiple outlets.
- Yiannopoulos has publicly advocated strict immigration enforcement, including ICE checkpoints and on-the-spot deportations for people unable to prove legal status.
Milo Yiannopoulos, the British far-right commentator and former Breitbart News editor who has publicly advocated aggressive immigration enforcement, has been deported from the United States after immigration authorities accused him of overstaying his authorization to be in the country, U.S. officials said Saturday.
A Department of Homeland Security spokesperson said Yiannopoulos, 41, was sent back to the United Kingdom on Friday after being detained by Immigration and Customs Enforcement at Louis Armstrong New Orleans International Airport. DHS said he legally entered the United States through New York City in May 2019 but “chose to overstay his welcome in violation of our nation’s laws.”
An immigration judge issued a final order of removal on July 22 after Yiannopoulos failed to appear for an immigration hearing, DHS said.
The accounts of his arrest varied slightly. The Guardian, CBS News and the BBC reported, citing U.S. officials, that Yiannopoulos was arrested Thursday at the New Orleans airport. NBC News reported that he was arrested Friday after failing to show up for the July hearing.
“DHS reversed the horrendous Biden-era policy that allowed aliens in our country illegally to jet around our country,” a DHS spokesperson said in a statement reported by CBS News. “Under President Trump, DHS will no longer tolerate this. This 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.”
NBC News, CBS News and the BBC reported that Yiannopoulos was deported to the United Kingdom. The Guardian reported that DHS did not specify the destination in its statement but that Britain’s Telegraph, citing two senior U.S. sources, said he had been flown back to Britain.
Yiannopoulos was believed to have been in New Orleans around the time of a concert by Ye, the rapper formerly known as Kanye West, at the Caesars Superdome on Friday, The Guardian reported. NBC News said it was not clear whether Yiannopoulos was in the city for the concert. Yiannopoulos has worked with Ye, including on the rapper’s short-lived 2024 White House campaign, and his social media account suggests he was working for one of Ye’s companies, The Guardian reported.
Yiannopoulos has long been a provocative figure in conservative and far-right politics. He supported Donald Trump during the 2016 election and headlined a “Gays for Trump” event during that year’s Republican National Convention, the BBC reported. He later became a critic of Trump while continuing to voice support for parts of his agenda.
He has also supported ICE and called for stricter immigration enforcement. CBS News reported that he posted in June 2025: “California needs ICE checkpoints at supermarket entrances, gas stations, strip malls, intersections and government buildings, with on the spot deportation for anyone who can’t prove they are in the US legally.” The BBC reported that he also wrote in 2025: “We have got to deport millions and millions of people. Without that, nothing else matters.”
Yiannopoulos previously worked as an intern for former U.S. Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene and has feuded with far-right commentator and Trump ally Laura Loomer. The Guardian and the BBC reported that Loomer claimed on X that she had reported Yiannopoulos to ICE over his immigration status. The BBC quoted Loomer as writing that he was “already out of the United States” and that DHS told her he was “NEVER allowed to come back to the United States ever again.”
Yiannopoulos rose to prominence as a conservative media provocateur but lost standing in some conservative circles in 2017 after footage surfaced in which he appeared to condone sexual relations with boys as young as 13. He denied allegations that he supported pedophilia, said he was speaking about his own experiences as a child, later apologized and resigned from Breitbart. He was also banned from Twitter in 2016 for directing racist and misogynistic attacks at actor Leslie Jones; his account was reinstated in 2022 after Elon Musk acquired and renamed the platform X.
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