A status update for the “migrant influencer” peddling squatting to illegal aliens marked him “detained pending further immigration proceedings.”
Sandwiching two American crises together had skyrocketed Venezuelan national Leonel Moreno to social media notoriety in recent weeks. Now, after nearly two years of roaming free under the watch of President Joe Biden’s administration, that attention appeared to set U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) on his case as he was arrested Friday in Ohio.
In a spokesperson statement, ICE explained that their fugitive operations officers had arrested the illegal alien in Columbus, Ohio within days of a report that the man had been violating the rules of his release in Border Patrol’s Alternatives To Detention program.
“Leonel Moreno is an unlawfully present citizen of Venezuela, who illegally entered the country April 23, 2022,” read ICE’s statement. “Moreno was placed into the Alternatives To Detention program by Border Patrol and was told to report to Enforcement and Removal Operations office within 60 days of arriving at his destination.”
“Moreno did not report as required. On March 29, 2024, Moreno was arrested in Gahanna, Ohio by officers with ERO Detroit’s Columbus office and is currently detained pending further immigration proceedings.”
NEW: ICE statement confirming Venezuelan illegal alien “TikTok influencer” Leonel Moreno was arrested by ICE in Ohio today. pic.twitter.com/6N1lIVlMvH
— Bill Melugin (@BillMelugin_) March 29, 2024
Now being held at Geauga County Jail, Moreno had caused a stir on social media primarily by encouraging illegal aliens to take advantage of soft-on-crime policies that sheltered squatters while violating the rights of property owners.
“If a house is not inhabited, we can seize it,” he had said in one of his TikTok videos before his account had been shut down. “I have thought about invading a house in the United States. I found out there is a law that says if a house is not inhabited, we can seize it. Here in the United States, the law of land invasion applies, and I think that will be my next business: invading abandoned houses.”
Noted migrant now promotes squatting as a business model. pic.twitter.com/sy8tTIMuzn
— Jorge Bonilla (@BonillaJL) March 20, 2024
In addition to promoting a secondary invasion of the United States after foreign nationals had already illegally crossed into the country, Moreno had called for his roughly half a million followers to aid a fellow Venezuelan national who had allegedly opened fire on officers of the NYPD in New York City’s Times Square.
The reported efforts of Jesus Alejandro Rivas-Figueroa to resist arrest while shoplifting had left a Brazilian tourist wounded from a gunshot.
Moreno had said according to one translation, “I invite you to look for [his] mother and all of us join to pay the bail, so that this young Venezuelan feels that you’re not alone in difficult times, but remembers that there is a God up there who sees.”
“Today it could be him, tomorrow it could be you…He did something wrong, it’s okay,” argued the illegal alien. “You don’t know when God is going to put you in a situation like the one this young man is in. We are going to unite forces so that this child is free and has an opportunity.”
Native of Brooklyn, NY, Kevin Haggerty is a graduate of Hunter College where he studied Cultural Anthropology and Geography. An avid reader and truth seeker, he currently resides in Texas with his wife and their dog and, when he isn't researching current events and their impacts, you'll find him spending time with friends and family or working on his next novel.
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