Video Event | Coronavirus and Corruption: How Kleptocracy Threatens the Global Response

Please be advised: This event will be premiering at 9:00 a.m. EDT, Monday, May 18. You may view this event on Hudson’s website at or after its premiere time on this event page.

Governments are spending trillions of dollars to contain the spread of COVID-19 and mitigate economic consequences of sweeping lockdowns. But as populations rely more than ever on public officials to perform their duties with integrity, reports of fraud and personal gain linked to the coronavirus response are surging.

Democracies and dictatorships alike are sidestepping important anti-corruption safeguards in the scramble to obtain medical equipment and prop up collapsing economies. Developing countries are acutely vulnerable, with health care systems and other vital institutions already weakened by decades of pervasive corruption. The United States' competition with China threatens to exacerbate this situation as the Chinese Communist Party expands its global influence through bribery and economic coercion.

Join Hudson Institute for a conversation about how the coronavirus pandemic has created a perfect storm for global kleptocracy that urgently requires U.S. leadership to prevent the response from being undermined by a new era of transnational corruption.