José R. Cárdenas is a consultant based in Washington, D.C., with nearly forty years of experience in the Washington political process and inter-American relations.

He has served in senior positions in the U.S. Department of State, the National Security Council, and the U.S. Agency for International Development, where he served as acting assistant administrator for Latin America and the Caribbean.

Cárdenas has also served as a senior advisor to the secretary general of the Organization of American States and as the senior professional staff member of the U.S. Senate Foreign Relations Committee.

In addition to testifying before both the Senate Foreign Relations and the House Foreign Affairs Committees, Cárdenas has written scores of op-eds, spoken at numerous venues in Washington and around the country, and been interviewed widely on hemispheric issues in national and international media outlets.

He has also served as a course coordinator at the U.S. Department of State’s Foreign Service Institute and has participated in the State Department’s Overseas Speakers Program.

Cárdenas was an event speaker at the Dialogue.