When Metro Weekly first spoke with Milo Miles, late last year, the Canadian adult performer was already well aware that crossing the border into the United States could be a risky proposition.

“In Canada, we have pre-clearance,” Miles said, referring to the U.S. Customs and Border Protection (CBP) Preclearance operation at Toronto Pearson Airport, whereby passengers heading to the U.S. are screened in Canada before boarding their flights, rather than when they land stateside. “They take their job a little too seriously. I have two phones, a personal one and a business one. The personal one usually gets cleared before I cross the border. No Trump memes, for example. Sex work is really frowned upon, and sex work alone is probably reason enough to prevent entry. There are precautions that I take.”

In January, however, as Miles attempted to fly from Toronto to Las Vegas to present at the GayVN Awards recognizing performers in gay adult entertainment, those precautions hit a figurative border wall. He was planning to attend a similar ceremony, the Grabby Awards, in Chicago next month, where he’s nominated for eight awards. Both events — and anything else taking place in the United States — will need to get by without Miles. He’s been banned from entry for 10 years.

Molly Cohen, a New York City-based immigration attorney and co-director of the Urban Justice Center’s Sex Workers Project, is awfully familiar with the CBP process.

“CBP officials at the border, they are completely deputized to make their own findings,” she explains. “There really isn’t a review process where you can challenge or appeal it when they make that decision.”

Cohen offers an example of a client, a U.K. sex therapist, who attempted to navigate the visa system to enter the United States.

“She worked with people with physical disabilities or complex trauma, particularly veterans, where it included intimate touch, emotional, supportive services, and sort of holistic care that included a sexual component from a healing perspective, which in the United Kingdom is fully decriminalized,” says Cohen. “She was very upfront about that when applying for [Electronic System for Travel Authorization], which is the visa-waiver program for certain countries and certain nationals. And she flew to the U.S., was detained by Customs and Border Protection and interrogated in exactly the same way for hours and hours in a very humiliating way. She also has autism and did not receive any kind of meaningful accommodation. She was interrogated for over six hours.”

At the end of those hours, she was labeled a prostitute, put back on a plane to the U.K, and banned from the U.S. for a decade. Trying to fight the ban proved fruitless.

“I accompanied her to the U.S. Embassy in London,” Cohen says. “We had a robust waiver with a detailed legal brief and supporting evidence ready to go. They simply refused to even look at it and said, ‘You are a prostitute. We’ve already found it. We’re not revisiting this. Get out.’ She was tremendously traumatized as a result of the experience.”

The CBP media relations office confirmed receipt of several Metro Weekly questions regarding the agency’s definitions of “prostitution” and “moral turpitude,” as well as trends in related bans and protocols for applying them, but has not yet received a reply.

Legrand Wolf, president and CEO of the Carnal Media adult-entertainment company, which promotes Miles as one of its exclusive performers, did provide a statement to Metro Weekly.

“Milo being stopped at the border would be one thing if he had been working illegally,” Wolf’s statement begins. “It would be one thing if he’d been caught smuggling or carrying contraband. But that’s not what happened.

“What happened is that border officers conducted what I believe to be an unlawful seizure and search of his electronic devices — a violation that should concern every American, regardless of what they think about adult content or gay sexuality. Then, without evidence of any actual crime, an officer looked at a gay man’s personal videos and photos and decided he was a prostitute. One officer’s moralistic snap judgment just cost Milo a ten-year ban from the United States.

“This is not law enforcement. That is targeted harassment dressed up in uniform.”

While the U.S. border, along with issues of residency, citizenship, immigration, and myriad related topics are more heatedly debated now than in any time in recent history — arguably ever — there is much more to Milo Miles than this ban. So much more. Not only has he made a lauded name for himself in adult entertainment, but he’s held elected office and earned a master’s degree in public policy from a top university. He’s not so much a boy banned, as a renaissance man of his own making.

The following feature has been edited and condensed from two separate interviews.

METRO WEEKLY: Hey, Milo. Good to see you.

MILO MILES: Good to see you, too.

MW: Because we’re based in D.C., kind of on the front line, tell us about your visit here for last summer’s World Pride.

MILES: The only other time I went to D.C. was during a class trip in high school. But I’ve always been a fan of politics. House of Cards played a big role in my pop-culture consumption during undergrad. I was familiar with the landmarks, the architecture, the way the city was designed. I’ve always been a fan of Washington, D.C., so it was nice to be back. But this time, it was a gay setting.

I mostly did just World Pride stuff. Went to the music festival, the street fair up near Capitol Hill. Went to some parties, some after-parties, and just had a really good time.

My first World Pride was Sydney in 2023. After that, I was like, I want to make a thing out of this, go to all the World Prides I can.

MW: Did you appreciate having the Canadian Embassy kind of looming over the festival?

MILES: There are so many Canadian flags. [Laughs.] A lot of embassies just put up one flag. Canada’s like, “No. Flags everywhere!”

It was definitely a lot more toned down than I expected, but it was still fun and nice to be surrounded by the fellow gays, to be part of that community, and to celebrate everything that comes with celebrating Pride on a global stage.

At the time, there was so much fear in the LGBTQ community in Canada about going to the States for anything, let alone World Pride. Most people who could’ve come just chose not to. I was one of the few Canadians who chose to come. The arguments were certainly there. There was the economic argument of why would we support a country’s economy when they’re imposing tariffs? There were a lot of policies against the trans community being implemented.

I am part of a gay water polo team, the Toronto Trigger Fish. The host city for one of the big tournaments, for International Gay and Lesbian Aquatics, was Washington. For years, I was planning on going to this tournament in tandem with my plans to attend World Pride. We have a contingent of members who identify as trans. It became a big debate within our water polo team, which has over a hundred members, about whether or not we should even send a team to participate. Ultimately, the team decided not to send one.

A lot of people just felt it wasn’t safe. January 6th was still in people’s minds. I think they were concerned about going to Washington, D.C., to celebrate Pride only to be met by far-right extremists, MAGA, or protesters. It was a nice surprise that I didn’t really see any protests.

MW: Do you imagine it would’ve been a better party if Kamala Harris had won?

MILES: That’s what I was counting on, seeing the first female president give a speech at World Pride. The excitement certainly went away a little bit after Trump got elected president. But my Airbnb was booked before the election, as we weren’t going to give up that spot. [Laughs.]

MW: You started crossing borders at a pretty young age.

MILES: I was born in Medellín, Colombia, at the height of great civil unrest. Medellín was considered one of the most dangerous cities in the world at the time. You had drug cartels, Pablo Escobar, guerrilla groups constantly fighting with the government, kidnapping people…. There are mass graves that the government is still digging up, trying to locate, just because of the sheer number of kidnappings and murders that were happening.

I had many family members who were victims of gun violence. My dad was a taxi driver, which was one of the most dangerous jobs in the city. Aside from being a police officer, taxi drivers suffered some of the highest murder rates just because of how easy it was to carjack or steal their car.

My family wanted to build a better future, and the easiest option was to move to Bridgeport, Connecticut, where we already had some family. For the record, a lot of my extended family, like fifty percent, are American citizens. When my parents first got married, they spent some time in Bridgeport, so I was conceived there. They thought it would be better to have me in Colombia. But it just got more dangerous and unstable, so my parents made the decision to bring us back to Bridgeport.

MW: You were 7 years old when you moved back, right?

MILES: I turned 7 when I landed in America. Two months after is when 9/11 happened. After that, my parents realized there really was not going to be any pathway to legally immigrate. There was an option to stay and hope for the best, that we don’t get deported. But when you don’t have legal status, you don’t really have an opportunity for post-secondary schooling. My parents recognized there was a big risk and also not a great future for me and my younger brother. Option two would be to go back to Colombia and face the dangers that were waiting for us.

Luckily, my parents found a third option, and that was to pack everything into a U-Haul truck, drive up to the Canadian border, and claim refugee status. Five years later, we became citizens. Canada is a lot more welcoming to immigrants and refugees than the United States is.

MW: How grateful are you that your parents made those choices?

MILES: I was so happy. I had a good sense of what was happening, even at that age. I could feel the burden and the weight that my parents were carrying on their shoulders. I was very happy when we were allowed to enter Canada, granted refugee status. At that point, I’d lived in three different countries. Canada just felt like home.

Had we stayed in the U.S., I probably would’ve been part of the DREAM [Development, Relief, and Education for Alien Minors] program the Obama administration implemented — that Trump undid. Long term, I probably would’ve been one of those people who got deported or captured by ICE [Immigration and Customs Enforcement].

MW: You’ve put down really amazing roots in Canada. You’re like a model citizen, participating, giving back, holding elected office….

MILES: One of my biggest passions, since I was little, was giving back to the community and doing volunteer work. I think it was a way of thanking the community for accepting me as one of their own. From being accepted as a refugee, then ultimately becoming a citizen, I had this great sense of national pride.

I became a Canadian citizen when I was in grade eight. That’s around the time when you’re eligible to start volunteering. I love doing community work. Part of the immigrant experience is that you tend to lack mentorship opportunities. So, I saw it as a way of getting real-world experiences, a way to inform what I wanted to do long-term in life. I volunteered at my local museum. I volunteered at my local hospital. Eventually that volunteer work started becoming more advocacy-focused, specifically health advocacy.

MW: This sense of advocacy clearly runs through your academic pursuits, earning a master’s in public policy, as well as winning a spot on a school board.

MILES: Yeah, I got elected to my local school board, one of the largest in Ontario, in 2018. At the time, I was the youngest elected official in the province, I believe. I was also the only member of the LGBTQ community to hold elected office in my city at the time. I was also one of the only people of color holding office.

Through my four-year term, my “gay renaissance” started. I went back to school to work on my master’s degree in public policy at the University of Toronto. And, for the very first time, I started making gay friends. I started joining friend groups that were part of the LGBTQ community. I was able to finally experience what it was like to be a full-fledged member of the community. Up to that point, I had prioritized my career and hadn’t really put much thought into my personal growth and development.

So, when 2022 came around, that was probably the most consequential year of my life. Not only was I finishing my master’s degree, I had to also think of what I was going to do next career-wise. I was up for reelection. I had to decide if I wanted to continue in politics. At that point, every major party was knocking on my door, asking if I would consider running provincially or federally.

I felt like I had a good run politically. I’m very proud of the initiatives and policies I was able to bring forward. But it was also some of the most exhausting years of my life, in politics full-time while also doing a master’s degree full-time on the side. I wanted to take a break to maybe realign some of my personal goals.

The idea of running my own business, of being an entrepreneur appealed to me ever since I was very little. When the opportunity came to transition from a career in politics to self-employed individual, I took it. There’s a surprising number of transferable skills from politics to porn. [Laughs.] In politics, you’re essentially creating a brand. You’re doing a bunch of marketing both online and offline, trying to convince people to vote for you. You need a certain level of communication skills. You need some soft skills, you need some website design, you need to figure out how to finance your campaign. I found myself using a lot of those same skills that I learned in politics.

I started an OnlyFans, did that for about six months. I was making just as much money as I was in politics — which isn’t saying much. But I was like, “Well, we’ve proven this can be sustainable in some capacity. It’s something I’m clearly very passionate about.”

I didn’t show my face for about half of that, because I was concerned about any potential backlash. Rightfully so. At the time, I was vice chair of my school board. I was chair of our finance committee. So I played things close to the chest. Doing porn on the side easily would’ve ended up on late-night talk shows. I think I’m lucky by virtue of living in Canada, because our media landscape is fundamentally different. I find that here it’s a lot more progressive and respectful.

Realizing it was something I actually wanted to do, after graduating and after announcing that I wasn’t going to seek reelection, that’s when I decided to shift my focus over to studio work. I waited till the end of my term, because I knew that studio work would expose me to a much larger audience.

I created a spreadsheet and reached out to as many studios as I could think of. I probably reached out to 40, maybe 10 of them got back to me. But the first response I got was from Legrand Wolf himself. Within 12 hours, I got a response back from him directly saying let’s set up a meeting. A few weeks later, I was on set for Fun-Size Boys.

It was honestly such a thrill. You grow up consuming porn, and you’re like, “Ah, wouldn’t it be nice to be a porn star one day?” Then for it to actually happen was not only a dream come true, but also a very fun and hot experience. I was so excited and happy after filming my very first scene. The level of happiness I experienced that day was actually comparable to the night that I won the election four years earlier. I took that as a sign that I was right where I wanted to be. And it’s been great ever since.

MW: Plenty of people will point to the porn industry as abusive or exploitative. Did you have reservations along those lines?

MILES: Before filming my first studio scene, I had the exact same concerns about doing porn in the first place. You’re aware of all these — I don’t want to call them misconceptions — stereotypes and assumptions about the porn industry you’ve heard over the years. It is an industry that has been exploitative of performers over the years, doesn’t have the most positive history. That was one of my big concerns: Am I going to be taken advantage of? Will my boundaries be crossed? Will I be safe? Ultimately, one of the things that I loved about Carnal is it’s always been a good, positive experience.

The way Carnal works with performers is not exploitative in the way other studios have worked with performers in the past. Carnal views performers as other businesses. This is a partnership, working with you, not using you or against you. As an example, when I started working with Carnal, Legrand Wolf’s desire was for all his performers to be successful. Not just on his websites, but on the performers’ own websites like OnlyFans or JustForFans.

I joined Carnal at a time when it was a condition of other studios that their performers, particularly “exclusive” performers with those studios, were not allowed to have their own fan sites. It was a clause in their contract, like the only website you’re allowed to appear on is that studio’s. But Legrand saw it differently. He saw it as cross-pollination, cross-promotion opportunities. If your OnlyFans is doing well, we’re going to support each other. There’s no harm in wanting both our businesses to succeed. I think that was unique at the time.

Since then, the porn landscape from a studio lens has changed significantly. Most studios no longer have exclusives. And Carnal is not only the largest porn studio now, but also one of the most supportive of its performers. I think the bar has been set high since Carnal entered the scene.

One of the nice things about working with Carnal is that they tend to have zero tolerance for bad actors. Some studios will enable toxic behavior from some performers. Carnal, because it operates almost like a family business, everyone has to pass a certain vibe check, so to speak, to make sure it’s a safe space for everyone. It’s the reason I’ve stuck with them for so long.

It’s been fun from the beginning. The environment has been very open and safe and welcoming. A lot of the time it feels like gay summer camp. Basically, you’re with a bunch of other guys, everyone loves sex as much as you do. Everyone loves what they’re doing as much as you do. And we’re all there to create art and to perform. And create magic. It always feels like a little vacation when we’re on set.

MW: On a related note, as you’re visible to the world, essentially, I’m compelled to ask about you being circumcised. That might seem silly, but thinking about your Colombian-Canadian history, that was a bit surprising.

MILES: The circumcision rate in Colombia is very low. I got circumcised when I was 26. Mexico actually has one of the highest rates of circumcision of Latin American countries. It has to do with socioeconomic status. Wealthier families will have a higher percentage of circumcised boys than more impoverished families.

It wasn’t until my “gay renaissance” when I started having more sex with men that I learned my foreskin was on the tighter side, caused some discomfort. I dated a boy who also got circumcised as an adult. He was able to kind of guide me through the process. Ultimately, I landed on the decision for a few reasons, one of them being that it was deemed medically necessary and covered for free in Canada. I’d probably still have a foreskin if I lived in the U.S.

MW: And that first shoot, “Fun-Size Boys” — at 5’4″ that sort of sounds right. You’re a bit shorter than the average guy. Was that ever an issue for you? Something you might’ve been bullied for?

MILES: Growing up? All the time. I was always the smallest kid in class — even though I was also the oldest. When we came from Colombia to North America, there was some kind of miscommunication and, for some reason, I ended up doing grade one all over again.

MW: Let’s turn to your story of heading to Las Vegas for the GayVN Awards. Can you walk me through it?

MILES: Especially after this Trump administration got into office, crossing the border has progressively been getting more stressful and scary.

MW: You’ve noticed a marked change with border control?

MILES: Yeah. Even with having NEXUS [expedited processing when entering the United States and Canada], I noticed that people were getting questioned or that more questions were being asked of me than would normally happen. It was in the news a lot of times, more Canadians getting detained or having their phones unlawfully searched. So it was in the back of my mind, like, “Not only am I Latino, but I should be maybe a bit more mindful of these things.”

MW: Simply with so much family in America, you must’ve crossed the border countless times. Must’ve been routine for you.

MILES: Tons of times, yeah.

MW: Generally without issue until this?

MILES: Generally without issue. I was only really given a hard time at a land crossing through Buffalo in 2016. I was a political science student, and I’d never been to a presidential rally. I told the agent at the border crossing I was going to see a Trump rally. They told me to pull over to the side and they were going to inspect my car. They searched everything, every nook and cranny of this car.

At the desk, there were three or four border agents all huddled around me, just standing there, arms crossed, asking me all these questions I never thought would be asked. They knew that I had spent some time when I was 7 years old in Bridgeport. “What were you doing in Connecticut?” “I don’t know. I was 7 years old.” They were trying to figure out if I was doing anything malicious when I was 7 in Bridgeport. When I went back for my second presidential rally, Bernie, I just said I was going shopping and they whisked me right through.

So, yeah, I’ve crossed the border many, many times. Especially post-pandemic. Like most gays, I had this itch to travel more. Tie that into the “gay renaissance” and of course I’m going to Market Days. I’m going to prioritize trips to Fire Island, to World Pride. I want to see what it’s like to be gay in West Hollywood, what it’s like to do Burning Man. I called myself an “airport twink” at the time, because I always know how to minimize waiting in line at security, and having NEXUS made it easier to cross.

Last January, when I was flying down to the GayVNs, I overpacked because I had to plan for that and a gay cruise afterward. My flight was scheduled for 9:15, it was a Tuesday night. I got there around 7:30. I get to the security line and NEXUS is closed, so we have to do regular security. Then there’s the long walk to get to the customs hall, you get to the person asking you if you have NEXUS or whatever, you continue down that line to the machine, it takes a face scan and tells you to go. Then the last step is to get confirmed by a passport agent who usually just says your name and then you’re free to go.

But this time he’s like, “Give me your passport.” He’s scanning my fingerprints. Sometimes they’re nice. This one wasn’t. He says he’s going to take me to the back for secondary screening, which never happens. Or hadn’t happened in a really long time, before I got NEXUS, once in a while just for a random screening.

So they take me to the back and he’s like, “Fill out this form. List all the countries you’ve been to in the last 10 years.” Oh, my gosh. I don’t even know, because I spent about six months out of the country last year. Meanwhile, he’s calling up my checked luggage. I had a Sniffies sticker posted on my bag so it’s easier to find on the conveyor belt. He’s like, “What do these mean?” implying it may be a gang symbol or something. “They’re just stickers. They’re gay stickers.” How am I going to explain Sniffies to a border agent? “Why do you have so much ‘gay’ clothing? What’s this about? Are you a dancer? What’s this?” He was so fascinated by the amount of luggage I had and why there was so much “gay clothing.”

MW: Guess he’d never been on a gay cruise.

MILES: Yeah. And I’m trying to explain that I’m going on a gay cruise afterward, that I wanted to have nice clothing for Vegas, that I have absolutely no dancing skills.

Then he goes through my backpack, and he’s like, “What’s with all these drugs? Are you sick? Are you okay?” Really, it was just fiber supplements, my PrEP, my Vyvanse, my 5-HTP. It was very confrontational, like, “Ah, I got you.” But I don’t understand what’s happening.

Eventually, he asks to see my phone. I give him my phone. He goes to the back, comes back 20 minutes later and accuses me of being a prostitute. “What do you mean? There’s no evidence of prostitution. There’s nothing. I’m not a prostitute.” It feels like it came out of left field.

Then he goes back again, more frustrated, seeming like he’s not enjoying his job. He takes a closer look at my phone and he sees I have pictures with other guys, with friends, hookups. He sees that I have text messages with friends, gay conversations. “I thought you were in a relationship. Why do you have so many discussions with other men? Do you have sex with other men? Why do you have sex with other men if you’re in a relationship?” It was so bizarre. The experience was very dehumanizing, to be honest, to feel like I had done something wrong when I hadn’t done anything wrong.

We’re back there for two hours. Now I’ve missed my flight. There’s no one else. It’s just me and him. He eventually says, “Well, I didn’t find anything. You’re free to go.” He escorts me out and then says, “There’s no more flights, so I guess we’ll do this all again tomorrow.” Well, that sounded very ominous.

I was at the airport for maybe another two hours trying to figure out what was going to happen to my luggage. I never got my luggage back, so I just went home with my backpack. I was just riddled with anxiety. Do I cancel my trip? What’s happening? Is this all going to happen again? I’ve never gone to bed with so much anxiety in my head. Could not fall asleep. I could not stop running through different scenarios.

Before all this, I had spent so much money on immigration lawyers to try to figure out a way I could either move to the U.S. or legally be allowed to work in the U.S. long term. But there was none. The fear was that even if we did submit an application, porn is considered sex work. In the eyes of U.S. Customs, sex work equals prostitution. The way lawyers were explaining it to me was that it’s all prostitution. So I’ve always been afraid of a border agent seeing that I do porn.

MW: An agent at the border is essentially judge and jury?

MILES: Exactly. It’s the reason I got a second phone, my work phone. It became the phone I did all my editing on, talk with other porn stars on. So, I’m going through all these scenarios in my head. What do I do? I just stayed awake the entire time. I essentially pulled an all-nighter.

My flight was rescheduled for the next morning, 9:30 or something. I got to the airport around 5:45 to give myself enough time if they question me again. If the night before took two hours, I should have enough time so I don’t miss my flight. The agent in the morning was a lot more welcoming. But as he scanned my passport, he’s like, “Oh, man, I’ve got to take you to the back. There’s a flag on your account. Anything could’ve triggered it.”

He took me to the back again, which was busier this time. They had other agents back there, and he gives my passport to one who tells me to sit down. He asks me what happened the night before. “I don’t know. Same thing as today. I guess there was a flag on my account. The other agent searched all my stuff, searched my phone, didn’t find anything.” He apparently called the agent from the night before who claimed he didn’t search my phone, so the agent I’m talking to now says he’s going to do it all over again. He’s going to search all my stuff again, including my phone. He’s asking me if I had marijuana in my luggage. He goes through my backpack again, goes through all the medication. He finds my work phone, which was dead. He plugs it in and searches everything. That’s when I kind of knew, well, they’re going to see that I do porn.

It was hours more of questioning and interrogation, six hours this day, two hours the day before. He was going through my phones and asking me questions. “Who’s this person? Who’s Papa?” “That’s my dad.” Eventually he gets to the second phone and he’s like, “You do porn.” I think that was his trigger for him to be like, “Oh, we’re definitely going to find something on this guy.” Sure enough, he found discussions I had with previous clients that I escorted with, which was enough to ban me from the U.S.

My brain has not stopped reliving the trauma, has not stopped trying to problem-solve it. What could I have done differently? One of those things, certainly, is maybe I just wouldn’t have given them the code to my phone. But in the moment, I never thought it would get that far.

The whole process was not very clear to me until after I was released. I didn’t really understand what was going on. I got no sleep. I’m dehydrated. I didn’t have anything for breakfast, so I’m starving. And I’m scared shitless. He starts asking me questions, basically meant to be a confession statement. “Have you ever exchanged money for sexual services?” I said, “No, I’m not a prostitute.” And he threatened charging me with fraud if I didn’t conform to their definition of prostitution, if I didn’t agree to the things they were accusing me of. It was the most challenging thing I’ve ever gone through in my life.

MW: As disturbing as this was, you must have been grateful at least that you were still in Canada.

MILES: That was the one thing that kept me grounded, knowing we’re still on Canadian soil, even if pre-clearance is considered American soil. I still knew I was going to get home that night. Knowing that I was still going to have that freedom is the one thing that kept me from completely breaking down. Though I still completely broke down when I was released. It was as dramatic as you could ever expect it to be. I’ve never cried more in my life. I’ve never sobbed more. I’ve never felt so much shame, fear, helplessness, and regret. It was like every emotion possible you would expect from someone grieving.

And then the challenge of, well, how do I get my luggage back? I have to get the airline to cancel my flight. Maybe I get a refund? I’ve got to call the hotel in Vegas. I’ve got to call the organizers of the GayVNs to tell them I can’t present an award. What do I tell people? Who do I tell? How do I tell? It was just this constant reliving of the trauma. I didn’t eat for days. I just cried. My body just shut down. There was this sense of emptiness and hopelessness. Of course, my partner’s going through the exact same thing, except he’s in Florida. The only way we could console each other was just being on the phone with each other for hours on end.

MW: Did CBP give you any kind of receipt? Something that says, “This is why we denied you?”

MILES: It’s like a 12-page document of my “confession.” It says, “Because of this confession, we are banning you for ten years.”

MW: So, they’re saying prostitution. Did they include fraud?

MILES: No, they left that off. The threat of fraud was only done verbally as a way to coerce me into their definition. To them, prostitution is simple. It’s the exchange of money for sexual acts, which I’ve never done. I may have exchanged money for time spent with an individual, for the “boyfriend experience,” but if sex happened in that context, it would be consensual and completely unrelated.

MW: You might argue half the marriages in the world could fall under that definition.

MILES: The first lady?

MW: Seems archaic.

MILES: Remember prohibition? Alcohol was against law once upon a time. Looking back at the ’90s when people would get caught with a tiny bit of weed and then be sent to ten years in prison.

Bringing my policy brain into this, trying to rationalize government policies and procedures, I think that whenever you go to the airport bathroom, there’s always a poster that is asking you to report suspicious activity related to human trafficking. And I think that all of this probably falls under that umbrella, which is that they have all these resources to prevent human trafficking, and part of that, I guess, is prostitution. But how do you measure quantitatively that you’re doing work to adhere to this policy? I think going after small fruit like gay content creators is how you do it.

MW: What’s your feeling about America now? What do you say to Canadians about this?

MILES: Avoid the country at all costs. It’s not worth it. It’s not worth the risk of being targeted.

MW: Any message for the Department of Homeland Security? Customs and Border Protection?

MILES: It’s time to revisit their policies and procedures.

MW: You will recover from this, right?

MILES: Yeah. My partner is going to move to Canada. We’re going to get married. He’s going to live here. Sure, I’m taking a big hit financially, but it’s not the end of the world. I still live in what I would consider one of the best countries in the world. I feel so safe here, so included, so welcome.

The Toronto community has really come around in support of my situation. I think most people recognize the challenges we’re having to deal with, not just individually, but as a community. The LGBTQ community is under attack again. We’re having to go back to our roots, advocacy and protest, to maintain our safe spaces. For me, this will probably result in a lot more advocacy work again, supporting other people who may find themselves in a similar boat or who are facing discrimination for being gay. We’ll see.

Find Milo Miles on Only Fans at onlyfans.com/milomilesxxx.

Follow him on Instagram at @milomilesx.