A former U.S. ambassador to Bolivia was working on behalf of Cuban intelligence officials even before he began a decades-long career in the State Department that included a stint in the White House during the Clinton administration, federal prosecutors said Monday.
Victor Manuel Rocha, 73, is accused of orchestrating one of the “highest-reaching and longest-lasting” infiltrations of the U.S. government by a foreign agent, Attorney General Merrick B. Garland said.
“For over 40 years, Victor Manuel Rocha served as an agent of the Cuban government and sought out and obtained positions within the United States government that would provide him with access to non-public information and the ability to affect U.S. foreign policy,” Mr. Garland said after the case, which first leaked late last week, was formally unveiled on Monday.
He is charged with conspiring to act as an agent of a foreign government without prior notification; acting as an agent of a foreign government without prior notification; and using a passport obtained by a false statement, federal prosecutors said.
Mr. Rocha, a Miami resident, was born in Colombia and became a naturalized U.S. citizen in 1978. He was already a loyal supporter of Fidel Castro’s Communist government in Cuba when he joined the State Department in 1981, authorities said.
“Rocha always kept his status as a Cuban agent secret in order to protect himself and others and to allow himself the opportunity to engage in additional clandestine activity,” according to court documents in the case.
At a first court appearance Monday in Miami, a tearful Mr. Rocha declined to enter a plea as prosecutors said more charges may be lodged against him. A detention hearing has been tentatively scheduled for Wednesday.
Throughout his U.S. diplomatic career, Mr. Rocha always denied working on behalf of a foreign government. But federal prosecutors said he was an agent of Cuba’s General Directorate of Intelligence, known as the DGI.
“Like all federal officials, U.S. diplomats swear an oath to support and defend the Constitution of the United States. Acting as an agent for Cuba — a hostile foreign power — is a blatant violation of that oath and betrays the trust of the American people,” FBI Director Christopher Wray said in a statement.
Even as he maintained a secret identity as a Cuban agent, Mr. Rocha rose steadily through the ranks of the State Department over the years. He served in several increasingly senior positions at American embassies in Honduras, Mexico and the Dominican Republic.
In 1994, he was assigned to the National Security Council as the director of inter-American affairs. One of his responsibilities was oversight of Cuba, according to the court documents in his case.
Mr. Rocha’s diplomatic career was capped off in November 1999 when he was named the U.S. ambassador to Bolivia. He later served as an advisor at U.S. Southern Command, responsible for U.S. military operations throughout Latin America.
“Those who have the privilege of serving in the government of the United States are given an enormous amount of trust by the public we serve,” Mr. Garland said. “To betray that trust by falsely pleading loyalty to the United States while serving a foreign power is a crime that will be met with the full force of the Justice Department.”
In late 2022, FBI agents were tipped off that Mr. Rocha had been working on behalf of Cuba for several years. An undercover agent reached out to him in Miami, saying Cuban intelligence officials instructed him to reestablish contact. They met on Nov. 16, 2022, in front of Miami’s First Presbyterian Church.
During the meeting, Mr. Rocha said Cuban intelligence officials had directed him to lead a “normal life” as a rising American diplomat. To throw off any suspicious of Communist leanings, he began to develop a public image as a “right-wing person,” FBI agents said in the court documents.
He said the meeting was his first with a Cuban official since 2016 or 2017 during his last trip to Havana.
Federal agents with the State Department’s Diplomatic Security Service interviewed Mr. Rocha on Dec. 1, 2023. Federal prosecutors said he “lied repeatedly” during questioning and denied meeting with anyone matching the description of the undercover agent. Then, they told him the meetings were recorded.
“Rocha stated that he did not want to comment,” according to the court documents.
• Mike Glenn can be reached at mglenn@washingtontimes.com.
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