Welcome back to the podcast, Bride Swindalor Steele. I'm Alexander Rogge. For today's podcast, I am delighted that we have the chance to listen in on remarks by Assistant Attorney General Ken Pollitt. He spoke at the 2022 Trace Forum. And now over to him.

Thank you so much for your introduction, Alexandra. That's very gracious. I want to start out by

thanking Trace as an organization and each of you in turn for your commitment in combating bribery.

I had an opportunity to serve as the U.S. attorney

in the Eastern District of Louisiana.

That is based in my hometown of New Orleans,

which is, in my humble opinion,

one of the world's great cities

that is known for a lot of good things,

like it's food and like it's music,

but it's also known for a few bad things,

like violence and corruption.

And as the World Bank has described that corruption is the single greatest obstacle to economic

and social development, and it estimates that corruption raises the cost of doing business by over

10%.

But what few people really appreciate is that fraud and corruption,

and I've seen it in my own hometown, affects the average citizen just as much as our business

community, if not more. The poor are particularly hard hit. It hinders investment from new or outside

companies. It results in fewer job opportunities for our average citizens.

And when an average citizen is then felt compelled to pay bribes,

for example, to Greece the bureaucracy of our government,

they are doing so from limited financial means,

...