Mari Carmen Aponte

Mari Aponte
Official portrait, 2022
United States Ambassador to Panama
In office
November 21, 2022 – January 20, 2025
PresidentJoe Biden
Preceded byJohn D. Feeley (2018)
Succeeded byKevin Marino Cabrera
Acting Assistant Secretary of State for Western Hemisphere Affairs
In office
May 5, 2016 – January 20, 2017
PresidentBarack Obama
Preceded byRoberta S. Jacobson
Succeeded byFrancisco Palmieri
United States Ambassador to El Salvador
In office
August 21, 2012 – February 7, 2016
PresidentBarack Obama
Preceded bySean Murphy (Acting)
Succeeded byJean Elizabeth Manes
In office
September 27, 2010 – January 2, 2011
PresidentBarack Obama
Preceded byCharles L. Glazer
Succeeded bySean Murphy (Acting)
Director of the Puerto Rico Federal Affairs Administration
In office
2001–2005
GovernorSila Calderón
Preceded byXavier Romeu
Succeeded byEduardo Bhatia
Personal details
Born1946 (age 79–80)
PartyDemocratic
EducationRosemont College (BA)
Villanova University (MA)
Temple University Beasley School of Law (JD)

Mari Carmen Aponte (born 1946) is an American attorney and diplomat who served as the United States Ambassador to Panama in the Biden administration from 2022 to 2025. She previously served as acting assistant secretary of state for Western Hemisphere affairs on May 5, 2016. She also served as U.S. ambassador to El Salvador from August 2010 until December 2011 and again from June 14, 2012, until December 2015. Before that she was serving as a member of the board of directors of Oriental Group, a major financial and banking services enterprise in Puerto Rico. President Obama also nominated her as the United States' permanent representative to the Organization of American States, but the Senate had not acted upon that nomination upon adjournment in December 2014.