Remarks by Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent before the American Academy of Achievement’s International Achievement Summit

Thank you for that generous introduction. I am deeply honored to accept this award and to join the distinguished company of my fellow inductees, doubly so on the eve of our great national milestone.The individuals recognized by this Academy over the decades share no single origin or path to their achievements—only a common sense of possibility, which we have come to call the American Dream.I have been blessed with a fulfilling and successful career. But my presence here today was far from predetermined.I was born and raised in the South Carolina Low Country. When I was nine years old, I started working two summer jobs. And I haven’t stopped working since, in a career that has taken me to nearly seventy countries over forty years.In November 2024, the call for public service came from the President-elect to serve as the seventy-ninth U.S.