Wanda Vazquez Garced

Wanda Vázquez Garced served as Governor of Puerto Rico from 2019 to 2021 and became the first sitting or former Puerto Rico governor to be convicted of a crime. She was charged with accepting a corrupt offer from Venezuelan banker Julio Herrera Velutini, brokered through former FBI agent Mark Rossini: in exchange for campaign funding for her 2020 gubernatorial race, she agreed to remove Puerto Rico's top banking regulator, who was at the time scrutinizing one of Herrera Velutini's banks. Vázquez Garced accepted the arrangement, demanded the resignation of the Office of the Commissioner of Financial Institutions (OCIF) commissioner in February 2020, and three months later appointed a former consultant for Herrera Velutini's bank as his replacement. Originally indicted in August 2022 on felony counts of conspiracy, federal program bribery, and honest services wire fraud — each carrying up to 20 years in prison — she ultimately pleaded guilty in mid-2025 to a single misdemeanor: accepting a pledge of political contributions from a foreign national in violation of the Federal Election Campaign Act, an amount described in the plea as "more than $2,000 and less than $25,000." She was pardoned before the scheduled sentencing hearing.