Wednesday, December 14, 2011

Speaker Presentation: State Auditor Tom Schweich

Topic: New Auditing Challenges Presented by the Faltering Missouri Economy

Location: Lodge of Des Peres

Meeting begins 11:30 AM and will include lunch

Meeting concludes at 1:00 PM

State Auditor Tom Schweich

State Auditor Tom Schweich is a fifth-generation Missourian and a graduate of St. Louis County Public Schools, Yale, and Harvard Law School. Schweich began his professional career at the law firm of Bryan Cave LLP, where he has practiced law for over 20 years, focusing on government contracts, corporate internal investigations and audits, litigation, and commercial disputes.

While this is Schweich’s first opportunity to serve the people of Missouri, he has a distinguished history of public service. In 1999 and 2000, Schweich was chief of staff for the Danforth Special Counsel investigation into the conduct of the U.S. government in connection with the 1993 siege of the Branch Davidian compound at Waco, Texas. Schweich then served as Chief of Staff to three United States Ambassadors to the United Nations. There, he helped uncover the Oil for Food Scandal, and helped root out corruption at the UN. Later, he served as Principal Deputy Assistant Secretary of State and Acting Assistant Secretary of State at the Bureau for International Narcotics and Law Enforcement Affairs in the State Department (INL). At INL Schweich oversaw the activities of 4,000 people in over 40 countries with an annual budget of $2.5 billion. Schweich helped design and implement programs devoted to police training, justice sector building, counternarcotics, counterterrorism, anti-money laundering, border security, and anticorruption. In his capacity as a senior U.S. international law enforcement official, Schweich led diplomatic missions to approximately 30 countries, including Pakistan, Nigeria, Botswana, Kenya, South Africa, Russia, Colombia, Guatemala, Poland, France, Germany, Hungary, Japan, Mexico, and Canada.

From 2007 – 2008 Schweich served as the US Coordinator for Counternarcotics and Justice Reform in Afghanistan. In March 2007, President Bush accorded Schweich the personal rank of Ambassador. In Afghanistan Schweich’s work helped curtail the opium production across the country and rebuild the country’s legal infrastructure and law enforcement bodies.

Schweich is the author of three books: Protect Yourself from Business Lawsuits (and lawyers like me) (Simon & Schuster 1998), Crashproof Your Life (McGraw-Hill 2002), and Staying Power (McGraw-Hill 2003). He also recorded the popular audio CD series on personal finance, Protect Your Wealth, published by Nightingale-Conant in 2004. He has written numerous articles and opinion pieces on foreign policy, politics, and the economy that have appeared in The New York Times, The Washington Post, USA Today, The St. Louis Post-Dispatch, Canada's Globe and Mail and other publications from Germany to Japan. He has been interviewed by hundreds of media outlets around the world from CNN to BBC, and was a regular contributor to KSDK-TV (NBC) in St. Louis on foreign policy issues.