Australian activist Drew Pavlou has gone viral on social media after laying responsibility for his deportation from the US squarely at the feet of pop star Billie Eilish. The 26-year-old took aim at Eilish after her acceptance speech at the 2026 Grammy Awards inflamed public debate over immigration enforcement.
At the ceremony on February 8, Eilish used her Song Of The Year acceptance speech to assail the operations of US Immigration and Customs Enforcement, invoking the names of Renee Good and Alex Pretti – two civilians killed by ICE agents on separate occasions. "No one is illegal on stolen land," Eilish said. "I feel like we just need to keep fighting and speaking up and protesting, and our voices really do matter, and the people matter. F**k ICE."
Billie Eilish reported me to ICE and got me deported cause I joked about flying to the US and moving into her mansion
She literally said "no one is illegal on stolen land" but called ICE on me
Honestly amazing performance art, I somehow managed to get Billie Eilish and… pic.twitter.com/Oupddkveq6
— Drew Pavlou 🇦🇺🇺🇸🇺🇦🇹🇼 (@DrewPavlou) February 16, 2026
The speech garnered the pop star applause and support from her entertainment industry colleagues, but also triggered a backlash. Many pointed out on social media that Eilish's own Los Angeles home stands on "stolen land" – land belonging to the Tongva tribe – rendering her remarks hypocritical. Pavlou seized on this perceived contradiction, telling his online audience he would enter Eilish's property to put her "No one is illegal on stolen land" declaration to the test.
In a video that got more than five million views and over 400,000 likes, the activist declared, "Big news, everybody, I've decided to move into Billie Eilish's six- million-dollar, Malibu beachhouse mansion... I'm packing my bags right away, and I'm looking forward to just taking possession of her six-million-dollar Malibu mansion. No human being is illegal." Pavlou even started a GoFundMe for flight expenses, raising $3,000 in an hour, then claimed the website took it down. "I'm not doing anything illegal, I'm just going to ring the doorbell with all my bags. I'm going to ask to move in, if they tell me no, I'll leave straight away," he said in another video.
Billing the scheme as "performance art," Pavlou later disclosed in his latest video that border agents had intercepted him at the US border, held him for over 24 hours, and ordered him out of the country. His lack of a visa was cited as grounds for returning him to Australia. "Billie Eilish reported me to ICE and got me deported because I joked about flying to the US and moving into her mansion," he claimed.
"She literally said 'no one is illegal on stolen land' but called ICE on me," he continued. "It's actually amazing performance art. As a joke, I managed to get Billie Eilish and Hollywood celebrities, left-wingers, liberals, to agree with ICE, border control. They suddenly support deportations... I deserve a commendation."
On Instagram, Pavlou described Eilish's statement as "an extremely radical viewpoint" that amounted to "essentially arguing that the United States of America should be abolished." Speaking to Sky News, Pavlou said he believed Eilish's legal team was likely behind the tip-off that alerted authorities to his arrival at her gated estate. "I was illegal on stolen land, unfortunately, unlike Billy Eilish's claim that no one can be illegal on stolen land," he said.
