Far-right figure Milo Yiannopoulos arrested in the US
The British activist, who was close to Steve Bannon and previously served as Kanye West's campaign manager, was arrested at an airport in Louisiana and is being held at an immigration facility. The circumstances remain unclear.
Milo Yiannopoulos, a far-right figure, is in the custody of U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) in the state of Louisiana, the website TMZ reported today (Friday).
Yiannopoulos has been a prominent figure in the American and global far-right for years, and he began his career at the Breitbart website, where he was recruited in 2014 by Steve Bannon, who later became a senior advisor to President Donald Trump.
The circumstances of the arrest are unclear. Sources who spoke to TMZ stated that Yiannopoulos was arrested at an airport and is being held at an ICE detention facility.
CBS reported that Yiannopoulos, a British citizen, appears as a detainee in the agency's online database, but the database does not specify where he is being held. So far, no response has been provided by ICE or the Department of Homeland Security.
Yiannopoulos is also known for his close ties to rapper Kanye West, and he served as his chief of staff for nearly two years until they parted ways in 2024, and was responsible for political operations in what was described by him as a presidential run.
West himself has become one of the most controversial figures in American culture in recent years due to, among other things, a long series of antisemitic statements, which led Adidas, Balenciaga, and other companies to cut ties with him. West is scheduled to perform tonight at the Caesars Superdome in New Orleans, which may explain why Yiannopoulos was in Louisiana.
Yiannopoulos built his public name over the years on staunch opposition to immigration, especially Muslim immigration to Europe, and was one of the prominent supporters of immigration enforcement policy in the U.S. In June 2025, he even called on social media to set up ICE checkpoints across California and deport on the spot anyone who could not prove they were in the U.S. legally.
Yiannopoulos, an openly gay man, also became famous for the gap between his orientation and his far-right positions, including opposition to some of the struggles of the LGBT community.
In 2017, he married his partner, but four years later he announced in an interview that he was a "former gay," said he had begun conversion therapy, and even expressed an intention to open a center for such treatments.
For over a decade, Yiannopoulos was considered one of the figures most identified with the American radical right, and built his name on repeated attacks on feminism, political correctness, and Islam. In 2017, he was forced to resign from Breitbart after his statements were exposed in which he appeared to justify sexual relations between adult men and minors.
