First woman and Mexican-American nominated as U.S. envoy to Mexico

WASHINGTON, Sept. 26 (UPI) -- U.S. President Barack Obama has nominated Maria Echaveste as the next U.S. ambassador to Mexico.

If approved by Congress, Echaveste will be the first female and the first child of Mexican immigrants to hold the senior diplomatic post.

Echaveste was born into a family of farm workers and grew up in California and Texas.

She earned her undergraduate degree from Stanford and her law degree from Berkeley.

From 1998 to 2001, she served as President Bill Clinton's deputy chief of staff for Latin American and Mexican issues. She was appointed by Secretary of State Hillary Clinton to serve as special representative to Bolivia from 2009 to 2010.

Although she has advocated for immigration reform, "She's a corporate lawyer, she's not Cesar Chavez," Rossana Fuentes-Berain, a prominent Mexican journalist and media executive, told the Washington Post.

"I have seen her work," said Fuentes-Berain, who has known Echaveste for several years. "She's tough and determined, and very curious about everything related to Mexico and Mexican Americans. She will come as the quarterback for the U.S. federal government in this super-complex, super-intense, and super-asymmetrical relationship."