Laura Loomer said she helped bring about Milo Yiannopoulos’s arrest and deportation, claims that have added a new dimension to the far-right movement’s internal disputes. Guardian US news published the analysis by Moira Donegan, a Guardian US columnist. Loomer, described in the analysis as a far-right influencer and conspiracist, said she had reported Yiannopoulos to immigration and federal authorities. Raheem Kassam and Benny Johnson also claimed they knew in advance about plans to remove and deport him, according to an account cited by Donegan.
The competing accounts raise questions, the analysis says, about whether confidential government proceedings were being passed to online influencers for public attacks. Donegan presents the episode as evidence of a deeper split inside Donald Trump’s movement rather than merely another prominent figure’s collapse. Her analysis describes an isolationist, anti-Zionist and increasingly antisemitic faction opposing a neoconservative, expansionist, pro-Israel and pro-military wing that pushed Trump toward war with Iran. As that conflict continues, the article says, rising prices and the prospect of punishment for Republicans in the November midterms are intensifying efforts within Maga to assign blame.
Yiannopoulos’s fall came after a career that once placed him near the center of the rightwing populist surge. The British-born provocateur was arrested by immigration authorities in Louisiana and deported from the US this week, after first gaining attention around the gamergate controversy and the wave that brought Donald Trump to office in 2016. He served as an editor of Breitbart News from 2014 to 2017 and built a profile by turning online outrage into attention and media coverage. The strategy involved provocative attacks and statements designed to fuel internet culture-war disputes, according to the analysis.
That once-novel position did not last as the rightwing influencer field filled with competitors, leaving Yiannopoulos at the fringe of the movement. Donegan says he later associated with figures including Marjorie Taylor Greene, Nick Fuentes and Ye while attempting to remain relevant. His earlier controversies also produced bans from major platforms and Australia, while resurfaced remarks about sexual abuse led to his resignation from Breitbart News in 2017 and the loss of a book deal. The article says those remarks, for which Yiannopoulos later apologized, helped show why the movement that he had helped galvanize no longer needed him. Donegan acknowledges that some readers may welcome the infighting, but argues that using government power in this way is damaging even as the factions turn against one another.