Zürcher Nachrichten - ICE detains British far-right activist Milo Yiannopoulos in Louisiana

British far-right activist Milo Yiannopoulos has been detained by US Immigration and Customs Enforcement in Louisiana, according to federal records.

The records did not identify the facility holding him. ICE's directory directed relatives and legal representatives to its Enforcement and Removal Operations office in Alexandria, a processing centre in central Louisiana about 200 miles from New Orleans. ICE and the Department of Homeland Security did not immediately say whether he would be deported.

TMZ first reported the detention. Yiannopoulos has lived and worked in the United States and was reported to have held an O-1 visa for people with extraordinary ability or achievement, but he has never been a US citizen.

Yiannopoulos worked at the right-wing website Breitbart from 2014 until 2017. He resigned after a backlash over comments about sexual relations between adults and adolescent boys. He later remained active in right-wing politics, working with white nationalist Nick Fuentes and former US representative Marjorie Taylor Greene.

In 2022, Yiannopoulos said he had arranged a dinner at Mar-a-Lago attended by Kanye West, Fuentes and Donald Trump. He also joined West's proposed 2024 presidential campaign, leaving shortly after West praised Adolf Hitler on Alex Jones' Infowars programme. Yiannopoulos later returned as West's spokesman. West was due to perform at the Caesars Superdome in New Orleans on Friday night as part of his 2026 tour.

Yiannopoulos married his long-term boyfriend in Hawaii in 2017, but in 2021 described himself as heterosexual and Roman Catholic and announced plans for a conversion-therapy facility in Florida.

Conspiracy theorist Laura Loomer publicised the detention on X and claimed she had previously reported that Yiannopoulos was in the country illegally. Yiannopoulos himself had called for mass deportations in a post the previous summer.

O.Hofer--NZN