- published: 01 Aug 2013
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Roger Francisco Noriega (born 1959, Wichita, Kansas) is currently a visiting fellow at the conservative think tank American Enterprise Institute. He has previously served as a U.S. diplomat and policy maker, specializing in Western Hemisphere Affairs.
Originally from Wichita, Kansas, he attended Washburn University in Topeka where he received a Bachelor of Arts degree in 1981.
Noriega served as the Senior Policy Advisor and Alternate U.S. Representative at the U.S. Mission to the OAS from 1990 through 1993, and as Senior Advisor for Public Information at the OAS from 1993 to 1994.
From 1994 to 1997, Noriega returned to Capitol Hill as a senior staff member New York Congressman Benjamin Gilman for the House Committee on International Relations. Subsequently, he became a senior staff member of Senator Jesse Helms (R-NC) for the Senate Committee on Foreign Relations. In 1996, Noriega co-authored the Helms-Burton law which tightened the 40-year-old embargo on Cuba.
Other tours of duty in the Department of State have been with the United States Agency for International Development (USAID) and the Bureaus for Inter-American Affairs and Public Affairs, where he was a Program Officer from 1987 through 1990 and a Senior Writer/Editor from 1986 until 1987. Prior to that, he served as Press Secretary and Legislative Assistant for Congressman Bob Whittaker (R-Kan.), U.S. House of Representatives, from 1983 until 1986. President Bush also appointed Noriega to the Board of Directors of the Inter-American Foundation.