The far-right activist known for being among the first to be removed from Twitter is now in ICE custody, TMZ reported on Friday.
Provocateur Milo Yiannopoulos was snatched by ICE in Louisiana and is currently being held in a detention center there, inmate records show. TMZ said that the circumstances are not clear, but he was detained at an airport.
Yiannopoulos worked for Kanye West as his “chief of staff,” until the two parted ways in 2024. He was also part of the Ye24 campaign and served as director for political operations.
West is scheduled to perform on Friday night in New Orleans.
TMZ recalled that one of the more recent Yiannopoulos scandals was when he accused West’s dentist of supplying the rapper with nitrous oxide for recreational use. The dentist denied the allegations.
Yiannopoulos is from the U.K., and not an American citizen. He has been a far-right media personality for years and has become prominent through the Gamergate controversies. He wrote for Breitbart News and drew attention with his deliberately confrontational online persona. He marketed himself as a gay conservative opponent of feminism, Islam, “political correctness” and social-justice movements, but critics say his public career relied on inflammatory attacks and harassment of marginalized groups.
Twitter permanently suspended Yiannopoulos in July 2016 after actress Leslie Jones received a torrent of racist and sexist abuse following his posts about her “Ghostbusters” reboot. Twitter said he had violated its rules against “inciting or engaging in targeted abuse or harassment,” though he denied responsibility and called the ban censorship. His account was later reinstated under Elon Musk’s ownership, NPR reported.
Opposition to him also stems from other controversies, including past statements appearing to defend sexual relationships between adults and underage boys. The fallout cost him his Breitbart job, a planned CPAC appearance and a book contract in 2017, KERA News recalled.
In late 2022, West introduced the far-right provocateur as his campaign manager and adviser. Yiannopoulos later said he helped arrange the infamous Mar-a-Lago dinner between Donald Trump and West, in which white nationalist and Holocaust denier Nick Fuentes also appeared.
Infighting in the West universe ultimately drove Yiannopoulos out. The West campaign’s treasurer later resigned and alleged that Yiannopoulos submitted potentially falsified invoices and engaged in improper campaign transactions. Yiannopoulos denied any wrongdoing. The association between West and Yiannopoulos added to the controversy surrounding both men, as it combined already inflammatory public conduct with Yiannopoulos’s record of far-right activism and online provocation.
