Chicago DJ Omar David Panqueva, known onstage as DJ Tunjo, and his husband Santiago Paez were detained by federal immigration agents outside Midway Airport this past Sunday as the couple prepared to fly to Washington, D.C. The Department of Homeland Security said the 26-year-old Panqueva and 27-year-old Paez, 27, were arrested for overstaying visas that expired back in 2022, even though the pair holds pending asylum cases, Social Security numbers and federal work permits.
According to the Chicago Tribune, the couple fled Colombia and sought asylum after facing persecution there as members of the LGBTQ community. Both an attorney and DHS confirm the two have no criminal history, and their attorney, Enrique Espinoza, said they applied for asylum before their visas lapsed.
A Rising DJ's Career Interrupted
Panqueva launched his DJ career in Chicago in 2025 and, alongside Paez, co-founded the Latin music and community event platform La Mesa Presents, according to a GoFundMe page set up by family. He performed at Chicago's Sueños Music Festival in Grant Park in May, and the couple hosted unofficial after-parties following Karol G's Soldier Field concerts two weekends ago. The GoFundMe notes the after-party series was slated to continue in at least 14 more states.
Espinoza told the Tribune the couple's immigration-case delay stemmed from an overwhelmed system, not any wrongdoing on their part. The distinction matters because a pending asylum claim does not, on its own, resolve the underlying visa-expiration issue that federal agents cited in making the arrest.
Family Learned of the Detention by Phone
Miriam Paz got a call from DHS/ICE about the arrest around 7:30 a.m. Sunday and spoke with Panqueva for roughly 20 minutes, per the Tribune's reporting. David Gallo, another contact in the local DJ scene, said he didn't learn of the arrest until Panqueva failed to appear for Sunday's scheduled event. Silvia Paez said her brother and Panqueva were in shock.
Transferred Out of State Under Illinois Law
Panqueva and Paez were transferred to Clay County Jail in Indiana rather than held locally. That's because the 2021 Illinois Way Forward Act banned local government contracts with ICE, ending all immigration detention facilities inside Illinois by January 2022, according to the National Immigrant Justice Center. Clay County Jail has held federal detention contracts since 2013 and completed a bed expansion in 2024, making it the primary Midwest facility for ICE detainees, per WFYI.
Part of a National Surge in Airport Arrests
The detentions come amid a broader expansion of airport-based immigration enforcement nationwide. A May 2025 memorandum of agreement between the TSA and ICE authorized federal agencies to share domestic passenger information, establishing the mechanism that lets agents identify travelers for arrest, according to American Oversight, which obtained the agreement through a public-records lawsuit. A DHS official reported that ICE now makes between 20 and 40 airport arrests daily across the country, up from fewer than 10 per day in May 2025, per Click2Houston.
Internal ICE records examined this year showed agents made more than 800 arrests after reviewing TSA security screening data on over 31,000 domestic travelers between early 2025 and February 2026, according to India Currents.
A Work Permit Doesn't Guarantee Protection, Attorneys Warn
Legal analysis published this summer noted that while a pending asylum application allows someone to obtain an Employment Authorization Document, it does not grant formal lawful nonimmigrant status if the underlying visa has already expired, per Barnes & Thornburg. Immigration attorneys have warned that domestic air travel now carries heightened detention risk for visa overstays, even for people with valid work permits and active asylum cases pending in court.
Millions of Cases Sit in the Backlog
The national immigration court backlog reached 3,195,137 active pending cases as of June, with 2,310,698 of those involving formal asylum applications, according to Syracuse University's Transactional Records Access Clearinghouse. Cook County alone held 108,934 active pending immigration court deportation cases as of June, ranking second nationally behind only Miami-Dade County, per the same data.
Chicago's LGBTQ Immigrant Community Responds
Manuel Hernández, with the organization Alma, said LGBTQ people often leave their home countries because of persecution tied to sexual orientation or gender identity — the same reasoning behind Panqueva and Paez's asylum claim. Alma assisted about two dozen LGBTQ immigrant families in 2022; by this year, Hernández said, that number had grown to more than 600 families.
Community Rallies Ahead of an August Court Date
Chicago's DJ and entertainment community has raised nearly $20,000 for the couple's legal defense through the GoFundMe campaign. Acro Presents, a promoter that had booked Panqueva, said Tunjo is family to the company, and he had been scheduled to headline a show at Zebbie's Garden, a venue with a capacity of about 430 people. Panqueva and Paez are due for an initial immigration court hearing next Wednesday, Aug. 19.
