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Deported
Milo Yiannopoulos says he is ‘ashamed’ of support for Trump
Tue 1 Sep
2026 21.49 BST
https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2026/sep/01/milo-yiannopoulos-deported-trump-support
Milo
Yiannopoulos, the British far-right commentator who was arrested last
week by Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE)
officers in Louisiana and deported to the United Kingdom, has broken his
silence about the experience, saying that “for the first time I know what it
feels like to be really, really terrified”.
Yiannopoulos
on Tuesday appeared on Piers Morgan Uncensored,
a YouTube show presented by Piers Morgan, the
British broadcaster and media personality. Yiannopoulos, 41, described the
experience in the US as “humiliating and disorientating”, “physically
degrading” and “frightening”.
He also
said that he was “ashamed” of his previous support for Donald Trump, who has
pursued an
agenda of mass deportation throughout his second presidency.
“I didn’t
really understand the physical reality of how institutionalized the brutality
is in America,” he said. “It’s like everybody that’s arrested is an MS-13
gang member, and it hurts a lot more than it looks like on
television.”
His
remarks came just days after he was deported from
the US, after being arrested
on Thursday by ICE officers at New Orleans airport.
In a
statement last week, the Department of Homeland Security (DHS), the parent
agency of ICE, said Yiannopoulos had “legally entered the country” in
May 2019, but “chose to overstay his welcome in violation of our nation’s
laws”.
Yiannopoulos
was an early
supporter of Trump before he first became US president in 2016. He is
a former
editor of Breitbart News and later worked to help the rapper Ye,
formerly known as Kanye
West, explore a presidential
run in 2024.
The
homeland security department said Yiannopoulos was issued a final order of
removal by an immigration judge on 22 July “after failing to show up for his
immigration hearing”.
In the
Piers Morgan interview, Yiannopoulos disputed the government’s account and
denied previously overstaying a visa. He said he is married to an American, and
claimed he held a green card that he was “renewing on a two-year basis”.
The
Guardian has contacted homeland security and the White House for comment on
Yiannopoulos’s remarks.
Yiannopoulos
also said that while he was detained, “no one would tell me anything” – a
common complaint from people held in ICE custody.
“I don’t
think I’ve ever been frightened like that before” he told Morgan. “I think
maybe in the past I’ve been a little bit blasé when people talked about their
trauma, a little bit cavalier when people talked about stuff kind of lingering
with them, but I get it now … I wouldn’t wish it on anyone.”
Last
year, in posts on social media, Yiannopoulos had been supportive of
Trump’s crackdown
on immigration.
In one post, he
wrote: “There is one concrete thing we must insist on this administration
delivering. It matters a lot more than debts measured in imaginary money. We
have got to deport millions and millions and millions of people. Without that,
nothing else matters.”
In
another post,
Yiannopoulos had said that 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”.
During
Tuesday’s interview, Yiannopoulos said of his past support for Trump: “If I had
any clue that anything remotely like this was even possible, I would never have
gotten involved in supporting Trump in the first place and I’m very ashamed
that I did.”
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