José
A.
Cárdenas
José A. Cárdenas - Senior University Advisor to the President for Social Embeddedness and Civic Engagement & Special Counsel
Mr. José Cárdenas is a 1977 Stanford University Law School graduate, he was a partner in the law firm of Lewis and Roca before joining Arizona State University in 2009. He also served as the firm’s managing partner and later as its chairman. Mr. Cárdenas served ASU as Sr. Vice President and General Counsel until July of 2022 when he assumed his new position as Senior University Advisor. He is also Special Counsel to the ASU Office of General Counsel.
Mr. Cárdenas serves on the boards of the CALA Alliance, (a Latinx arts organization based in Phoenix) and of the East Valley Hispanic Chamber of Commerce. And he is a Trustee of the Virginia G. Piper Charitable Trust. He also serves on the boards of some of ASU's affiliated entities including Zócalo Public Square and the ASU Preparatory Academy. Mr. Cárdenas was a founding board member of the Translational Genomics Research Institute (TGen), which he chaired from 2002 to 2011. Mr. Cárdenas served as a member of the executive committee of the Arizona Super Bowl Host Committee, (2003-2015), He has also served on many other boards of directors including those of Meridian Bank, Swift Transportation, Southwest Gas Corporation, The Center for the Future of Arizona, Chicanos Por La Causa, the Arizona Hispanic Chamber of Commerce, Xico Inc., (an ethnic arts organization), the Mesa Association of Hispanic Citizens and Los Abogados Hispanic Bar Association. Mr. Cárdenas also served as a commissioner on Arizona’s Commerce and Economic Development Commission and he served three Governors as president of the Arizona-Mexico Commission.
For almost two decades, Mr. Cárdenas served as the host of the Eight/KAET weekly public affairs program, Horizonte, which focuses on Arizona issues through an Hispanic lens. In 2000, he received the Mexican government's Ohtli award given to U.S. residents of Mexican descent in recognition of their service to Mexican communities in the United States. He was Valley Leadership’s 2000 Man of the Year.