Despite the highly publicized California riots against them, U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement is still hard at work implementing President Donald Trump’s sweeping immigration agenda.

While Los Angeles burns in protest against them, ICE agents are continuing to round up all manner of illegal immigrants in the country — even wildly popular ones.

According to multiple reports, ICE agents have apprehended Khaby Lame, an Italian-Senegalese immigrant who happens to have the most followers on the polarizing social media app TikTok.

USA Today reported that Lame (full name Seringe Khabane Lame) was detained at Harry Reid International Airport in Las Vegas on Friday.

ICE confirmed the detainment with the outlet on Sunday.

Lame rose to fame during the pandemic, according to The Hill. Before that brush with fame, Lame was born in Senegal, and then moved to Italy as a baby.

(The 25-year-old gained Italian citizenship in 2022.)

Lame would eventually reach the United States, where his quirky humor found a massive audience on TikTok.

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“Using the hashtag ‘learnfromkhaby’ on many of his videos, Lame’s fame is more akin to the internet stardom of yore, in which an exasperated look or a quick humorous bit, stripped of any high production value or product placement, could take off on Vine,” USA Today describes.

That “internet stardom of yore” has translated to a whopping 162.2 million followers on TikTok.

Here’s one such example of Khaby’s popular recent videos:

@khaby.lame My bad man , I was training 🥷🏾#learnfromkhaby #comedy ♬ original sound – Khabane lame

In a simple video captioned, “My bad man, I was training,” Khaby took a viral America’s Funniest Videos clip and added his own bizarre bit of anime humor to it.

The above video, in all of its quirkiness, has over 17 million views.

Just to compare numbers, Lame’s 162 million followers is more than Dwayne “The Rock” Johnson and President Donald Trump … combined. Johnson has 80.4 million followers, while the president has 15.1 million followers.

World’s top TikTok star Khaby Lame allowed to ‘self-deport’ by ICE after attending Met Gala – and then overstaying visa https://t.co/CKcsKpoWae pic.twitter.com/EYavDdFJaw

— New York Post (@nypost) June 9, 2025

(Interestingly, while Trump has the fewest TikTok followers of the above three men, he has some of the most-watched videos, including one with over 83 million views.)

In spite of, or perhaps due to, the enormous following, he was put on ICE’s radar for apparently violating his visa.

He “overstayed the terms of his visa” after entering the country on April 30, according to what ICE told USA Today.

Lame was granted voluntary departure after being detained.

Sr. Editor / Sr. Writer

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Bryan Chai has written news and sports for The Western Journal for more than five years and has produced more than 1,300 stories. He specializes in the NBA and NFL as well as politics.

Bryan Chai has written news and sports for The Western Journal for more than five years and has produced more than 1,300 stories. He specializes in the NBA and NFL as well as politics. He graduated with a BA in Creative Writing from the University of Arizona. He is an avid fan of sports, video games, politics and debate.

Birthplace

Hawaii

Education

Class of 2010 University of Arizona. BEAR DOWN.

Location

Phoenix, Arizona

Languages Spoken

English, Korean

Topics of Expertise

Sports, Entertainment, Science/Tech

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