{"id":409,"date":"2026-05-16T05:04:08","date_gmt":"2026-05-16T05:04:08","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/southfloridamovingguides.com\/?p=409"},"modified":"2026-05-16T05:04:08","modified_gmt":"2026-05-16T05:04:08","slug":"feds-seek-to-strip-u-s-citizenship-of-ex-ambassador-who-spied-for-cuba-2","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/southfloridamovingguides.com\/?p=409","title":{"rendered":"Feds seek to strip U.S. citizenship of ex-ambassador who spied for Cuba"},"content":{"rendered":"
\n

MIAMI \u2014 U.S. Attorney Jason A. Reding Qui\u00f1ones described Victor Manuel Rocha on Friday as \u201cone of the most prolific Cuban spies ever uncovered in the United States.\u201d<\/p>\n

Read more Family prays for 9-month-old fighting for life after deadly I-75 crash<\/a><\/p>\n

Leer en espa\u00f1ol<\/p>\n

The Colombian-American New Yorker, who served in both the U.S. Department of State and Department of Defense, lived in Key Biscayne when FBI agents arrested him in 2023. <\/p>\n

\u201cI have created the legend of a right-wing person,\u201d Rocha told an undercover agent pretending to work for Cuba\u2019s Intelligence Directorate during a meeting on Nov. 16, 2022, in Brickell, records show. <\/p>\n

Rocha, 75, who moved to the U.S. when he was 10 and became a U.S. citizen at 28, is serving 15 years in prison in central Florida. On Thursday, federal prosecutors moved to revoke his U.S. citizenship. <\/p>\n

\u201cThe complaint alleges that Rocha obtained American citizenship through lies, concealment, and betrayal,\u201d Reding Qui\u00f1ones said in a statement about the new civil denaturalization complaint. \u201cA person who secretly serves communist Cuba should not keep the privilege of United States citizenship, even while in prison.\u201d<\/p>\n

Federal Bureau of Prisons records on Friday showed Rocha was at a low-security correctional institution in Sumter County, and his release date wasn\u2019t until March 29, 2036. <\/p>\n

FBI Miami special agents profiled Rocha and zeroed in on him in 2022. He was born in Bogot\u00e1 during the Liberal-Conservative warfare displacement in Colombia. <\/p>\n

After his father died, Rocha moved to New York City when he was 10 years old and grew up in Harlem with Rosalba Leon, his single mother, who worked as a seamstress in sweatshops. <\/p>\n

Rocha\u2019s fate changed after the 1964 race riots in Harlem. He won a scholarship to the Taft School, a private boarding school in Connecticut, graduated cum laude in 1969, and earned his bachelor\u2019s degree in Latin American studies from Yale in 1973.<\/p>\n

\u201cRocha was attending a student program in Chile in 1973 when he was first approached by and started conspiring to spy for the Republic of Cuba,\u201d prosecutors wrote in a 232-page civil denaturalization complaint filed on Thursday. <\/p>\n

It was a year of change in Chile. Salvador Allende, the first democratically elected Marxist leader in Latin America, was overthrown by a military coup, and Gen. Augusto Pinochet took power.<\/p>\n

\u201cDuring my formative years in college, I was heavily influenced by the radical politics of the day,\u201d Rocha told a federal judge in court on April 12, 2024, records show. <\/p>\n

Rocha earned a master\u2019s degree in public administration from Harvard University in 1976 and a master\u2019s degree in international relations from Georgetown University in 1978 \u2014 \u201cto advance his service as a secret agent of Cuba,\u201d according to the complaint. <\/p>\n

Rocha was a student at Georgetown when he applied for citizenship, and he was 28 when he took the oath of allegiance in Virginia to receive his certification of naturalization on Sept. 17, 1978, records show. <\/p>\n

\u201cHad Rocha been truthful during his naturalization proceedings regarding his affiliation with the Communist Party and actions as its secret agent, the former Immigration and Naturalization Service would not have recommended approval,\u201d prosecutors wrote in the complaint. <\/p>\n

Rocha joined the U.S. foreign service in 1981 after an internship at the Inter-American Foundation, a federal agency that funds projects in Latin America and the Caribbean.<\/p>\n

Read more Surveillance video, witness testimony highlight day 2 of Randazzo murder trial<\/a><\/p>\n

After diplomatic assignments in the Dominican Republic, Honduras, Mexico, Cuba, and Argentina, President Bill Clinton appointed him as U.S. Ambassador to Bolivia on June 14, 2000.<\/p>\n

\u201cMy deep commitment at that time to radical social change in the region led me to the eventual betrayal of my oath of loyalty to the United States during my two decades in the State Department,\u201d Rocha told a federal judge in court on April 12, 2024, records show. <\/p>\n

Rocha left the State Department in 2002 and went on to become an advisor to the Commander of the United States Southern Command in Doral.<\/p>\n

\u201cRocha would and did provide false and misleading information to the United States to obtain and maintain employment, and to acquire and maintain access to sensitive and classified information,\u201d prosecutors wrote in the complaint. <\/p>\n

An undercover agent contacted Rocha on Nov. 15, 2022, claiming to represent his \u201cfriends in Havana,\u201d and there were three recorded meetings before questioning him on Dec. 1, 2023, records show. <\/p>\n

During the recorded meetings, Rocha referred to the U.S. as the \u201cenemy,\u201d praised Fidel Castro as the \u201cComandante,\u201d and his fellow communists as his \u201ccomrades,\u201d according to court records. <\/p>\n

\u201cUnfortunately, she was betrayed … a huge betrayal … sadly she would have done much more had she not been betrayed,\u201d Rocha told the undercover agent on Feb. 17, 2023, about Ana Bel\u00e9n Montes, a former senior analyst at the U.S. Defense Intelligence Agency, who was arrested for spying for Cuba in 2001, records show. <\/p>\n

Rocha talked to the undercover agent about the 1996 killings of the Brothers to the Rescue volunteers Carlos Costa, Armando Alejandre, Jr., Mario de la Pe\u00f1a, and Pablo Morales, records show. <\/p>\n

\u201cI lived through it because I was in charge. It was the knockdown of the small planes. That was a time of a lot of tension. Brothers to the Rescue and other similar people who were pushing politics towards unnecessary provocations,\u201d Rocha told an undercover agent on Nov. 16, 2022, records show. <\/p>\n

Rocha also said that during his espionage, he had used a Dominican Republic passport to travel to Panama and then to Havana, records show. <\/p>\n

\u201cThis is a huge sacrifice. Huge, with a lot of tension that you have to manage internally with self-discipline, all the time … When you have the conviction, you have self-discipline,\u201d Rocha told the undercover agent about his \u201calmost\u201d four-decades of work as a spy, which included some with \u201cTop Secret\u201d access, records show. <\/p>\n

Rocha also described his work for Cuba as \u201cenormous\u201d and \u201cmore than a grand slam,\u201d records show. <\/p>\n

Rocha pleaded guilty to conspiracy to act as an agent of a foreign government and defrauding the U.S. In the new case, federal prosecutors accused him of seven independent counts seeking the revocation of his U.S. citizenship. <\/p>\n

\u201cAny individual who lied during the naturalization process to gain a foothold in this country will be met with the full weight of the Department of Justice,\u201d Assistant Attorney General Brett Shumate said in a statement released on Friday. <\/p>\n

Read more Evidence points to human remains at home linked to Kristin Smart\u2019s killing, sheriff says<\/a><\/p>\n

Rocha\u2019s career with the State Department<\/b><\/p>\n