CHICAGO (AP) — The family of a man shot dead by an immigration enforcement agent in the Chicago area last year moved to sue the government on Thursday for a shooting they allege was unlawful and could have been prevented, according to attorneys for the family.
Silverio Villegas Gonzalez, a 38-year-old Mexican national who had lived in the U.S. for 18 years, was fatally shot last fall by an Immigration and Customs Enforcement agent who stopped his car during “Operation Midway Blitz,” the Trump administration's immigration crackdown in Chicago.
The Department of Homeland Security initially said the agent was dragged by Villegas Gonzalez' vehicle and then shot Villegas Gonzalez in self-defense. A coroner’s report determined Villegas Gonzalez was shot from behind, at close range.
“This horrific shooting was unlawful and wholly preventable,” attorneys wrote in the claim.
The claim seeks compensation and gives the federal government six months to respond before a lawsuit can be filed. It comes days after lawyers filed a lawsuit against DHS on behalf of Marimar Martinez, who survived being shot five times in her car by an immigration agent in Chicago, less than a month after Villegas Gonzalez' death. An independent analysis of the shooting found the agent fired at her from behind, contradicting his statements to the FBI that he feared Martinez would drive into him, according to her lawyers.
Federal law does not allow for lawsuits against individual agents.
Jonathan Manes, an attorney for Villegas Gonzalez’ family, declined to share the amount of compensation they are seeking, but told The Associated Press they plan to ask the judge for a “very large amount of damages at trial.”
“The way that the administration has reflexively sought to smear Silverio and call it justified doesn’t suggest to us that they’ll be willing to settle,” Manes said. “We expect that, in six months' time, we’ll be in federal court where the government has to answer for this, where the truth can come out.”
Illinois State Police announced an investigation into the shooting in May.
Villegas Gonzalez, a line cook at a local diner, had just dropped off his two young sons at school and daycare on the morning of Sept. 12, 2025, in the Chicago suburb of Franklin Park, when ICE agents pulled their Jeep in front of his car, according to the claim.
As the two agents stood on either side of his car, leaning on the window frames, Villegas Gonzalez reversed about 50 feet (15.24 meters) and started to drive away into the open traffic lane. Surveillance video captured the sound of gunshots as one agent chased the car, which crashed into a parked delivery truck. The truck driver called 911, and Villegas Gonzalez was pronounced dead at a hospital about an hour later.
A medical examiner found that Villegas Gonzalez was shot downward, through the back of his neck. “The ICE officer was therefore standing alongside the driver’s side of Silverio’s vehicle when he fired the fatal shot, effectively executing Silverio at close range,” attorneys wrote in the complaint.
Immediately after the shooting, DHS said in a news release that Villegas Gonzalez was in the U.S. illegally and had dragged the agent with his car as he tried to flee. The release said the agent was seriously injured and “fearing for his life."
The agent told police who responded to the shooting that his injuries were “nothing major,” according to police body-worn camera footage previously obtained by the AP.
Attorneys wrote in the claim that the agent was not in the path of the vehicle, and chose to hold onto the windows.
Villegas Gonzalez had “no criminal record and only a few minor traffic violations,” it added.
DHS has not identified the agent. Neither of the ICE agents were wearing body-worn cameras when Villegas Gonzalez was shot. The Department did not respond to a request for comment. It was not immediately clear if DHS had received the claim.
Martinez and Villegas Gonzalez are among a growing number of people shot in their cars by federal agents across the country amid the Trump administration’s immigration enforcement sweeps. DHS has characterized the shootings as self-defense against people using their vehicles as weapons.
Mayes-Osterman is a corps member for The Associated Press/Report for America Statehouse News Initiative. Report for America is a nonprofit national service program that places journalists in local newsrooms to report on undercovered issues.
FILE - A Chicago Police Department car is reflected in the window of Luna y Cielo Play Cafe, where a framed picture is displayed of Silverio Villegas Gonzalez who was killed in an interaction with federal immigration enforcement (ICE) agents, as part of a Mexican Day of the Dead altar in Chicago's Logan Square neighborhood, Wednesday, Oct. 15, 2025. (AP Photo/Rebecca Blackwell, File)
WASHINGTON (AP) — President Donald Trump's administration is suspending tech giant Microsoft from a program to apply for green cards for workers who come to the U.S. to live and work using H-1B visas as it accuses the company of fraud.
Supporters of the Republican president have long argued that various programs like the one Vice President JD Vance accused Microsoft of abusing essentially empower American companies to recruit foreign workers for jobs that end up undercutting Americans. In a wide-ranging announcement Thursday, Vance and other top administration officials also called out universities over their use of J-1 visas for international students and information technology outsourcing firms.
The announcement came hours before Trump was scheduled to award the National Medal of Technology and Innovation to Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella, part of an event at which he is granting some of the nation’s most prestigious science and technology awards to his tech billionaire allies.
Vance said the program from which Microsoft is being suspended requires companies to advertise jobs in America before applying to the Department of Labor to show they need to give a foreign worker a green card because of a lack of American workers.
“They’ll put an advertisement in a small-town newspaper. They’ll go out there and say that ‘We have advertised for a position with our company, and nobody is responding to it.’ And they will use that lack of response to then go and replace American workers with what is effectively foreign indentured servants," Vance said. “There has been no company in the United States, unfortunately, that has used this system more than Microsoft."
Microsoft is No. 5 among U.S. employers when it comes to using H-1B visas, according data from U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services. Amazon is No. 1.
Microsoft, which is based in Redmond, Washington, near Seattle, did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
Doug Rand, a former senior adviser at USCIS during the Biden administration, called Vance's announcement “incoherent.”
“If the Trump administration were truly concerned that H-1B workers are ‘indentured servants,’ then the last thing they would do is block companies from helping their own H-1B workers get green cards,” he said. "Once you have a green card, you’re no longer dependent on your employer for your immigration status — you’re a permanent resident who can change jobs and negotiate higher wages without fear.”
Vance said Microsoft last year laid off 6,000 American workers but also obtained 6,300 H-1B visas and almost 3,000 green cards.
“If you do the math, for every worker that Microsoft laid off, they replaced that worker with one and a half foreign indentured servants,” Vance said in a White House news conference announcing the decision. "Our message to Microsoft is: You’re a great American company, but you’ve got to hire great American workers."
Vance said H-1B workers are effectively foreign indentured servants because if they lose their job, they have to leave the country, and they earn less than Americans in the same position.
The H-1B program has long been a target of Trump supporters who say that the program undercuts American workers and is rife with abuse.
H-1B visas are meant for high-skilled jobs that are difficult to find American workers to fill. Technology companies are the biggest users, with nearly three-quarters of approvals going to workers from India.
Trump last year attempted to ratchet up the fee for H-1B work visas to $100,000, saying it would protect American workers from losing their jobs to lower-paid foreigners, but a federal judge struck that down in June.
The administration has since tried a different tack, announcing plans in August for a $103,265 fee. The proposed regulation described the new fee as a “dedicated revenue mechanism to help recover a portion of the federal government’s costs of administering the lawful immigration system.” The rule isn’t yet final and is expected to face a legal challenge, like the one before it.
The Vance announcement came a day after Trump's administration launched another broadside against international students and their ability to work in the U.S.
The Department of Homeland Security on Wednesday proposed a $70,000 fee for international students seeking to work in the United States. The proposed rule would require schools to pay the fee for every student who participates in the Optional Practical Training program, known as OPT, which allows students to work in jobs related to their major during or after their time in school.
Vance also called out universities that he suggested were abusing a program to allow international students to come to the U.S. These temporary visas, called J-1 visas, allow international visitors to temporarily come to the U.S. for work and study exchange programs. Vance singled out nine universities that he said merited further investigation for J-1 visa fraud, saying they used the program in greater proportions than their counterparts.
Associated Press writer Heather Hollingsworth contributed from Mission, Kansas. Ortutay reported from Oakland, Calif.
Vice President JD Vance speaks as Stephen Miller, White House deputy chief of staff, from left, and Attorney General Todd Blanche listen during a news conference on the Fraud Task Force inside the Eisenhower Executive Office Building on the White House campus, Thursday, Oct. 8, 2026, in Washington. (AP Photo/Tom Brenner)
Vice President JD Vance speaks as Labor Secretary Keith Sonderling listens during a news conference on the Fraud Task Force inside the Eisenhower Executive Office Building on the White House campus, Thursday, Oct. 8, 2026, in Washington. (AP Photo/Tom Brenner)
Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella walks to the White House to attend a state dinner hosted for China's President Xi Jinping, Thursday, Sept. 24, 2026, in Washington. (AP Photo/Carolyn Kaster)
Vice President JD Vance speaks during a news conference on the Fraud Task Force inside the Eisenhower Executive Office Building on the White House campus, Thursday, Oct. 8, 2026, in Washington. (AP Photo/Tom Brenner)
Stephen Miller, White House deputy chief of staff, listens as Vice President JD Vance speaks during a news conference on the Fraud Task Force inside the Eisenhower Executive Office Building on the White House campus, Thursday, Oct. 8, 2026, in Washington. (AP Photo/Tom Brenner)
Vice President JD Vance speaks during a news conference on the Fraud Task Force inside the Eisenhower Executive Office Building on the White House campus, Thursday, Oct. 8, 2026, in Washington. (AP Photo/Tom Brenner)
