{"id":1308,"date":"2026-07-19T02:43:49","date_gmt":"2026-07-19T02:43:49","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.sterlingcooper.info\/blog\/?p=1308"},"modified":"2026-07-19T02:43:49","modified_gmt":"2026-07-19T02:43:49","slug":"billionaire-ambassador-to-italy-shows-off-his-yacht","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.sterlingcooper.info\/blog\/billionaire-ambassador-to-italy-shows-off-his-yacht\/","title":{"rendered":"BILLIONAIRE AMBASSADOR TO ITALY SHOWS OFF HIS YACHT"},"content":{"rendered":"
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As Trump Scraps With Meloni, His Envoy to Italy Is at Sea<\/h1>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/figure>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n
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Tilman J. Fertitta, the U.S. ambassador to Rome, is summering on his superyacht as President Trump squabbles with Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni of Italy.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/header>\n<\/div>\n

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In recent weeks, while President Trump was locked in an unusually testy standoff with Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni of Italy, the United States ambassador to Rome was on a monthslong tour of Italy\u2019s coastline aboard his $450 million superyacht.<\/p>\n

As the leaders\u2019 spat escalated over the Independence Day weekend, the ambassador, Tilman J. Fertitta, moored the 384-foot, seven-deck yacht off Palermo in Sicily to host a phalanx of Sicilian dignitaries.<\/p>\n

The visitors could gawk at the boat\u2019s pools, hot tubs, spa that offers facials and pedicures, movie screening room, putting green, multiple bars and two helicopters. They sipped wine, nibbled antipasti and posed for the ambassador\u2019s Instagram feed \u2014 shoeless, as footwear is forbidden on the yacht \u2014 in rooms decorated with fluorescent artwork, varnished wood, crystal sculptures and chandeliers.<\/p>\n

Mr. Trump was about to roast Ms. Meloni, posting on social media that he needed to take out a \u201crestraining order<\/a>\u201d against her, two weeks after he claimed she had \u201cbegged<\/a>\u201d him for a photo at a gathering of world leaders. Mr. Fertitta, 69, seemed unconcerned by the political fracas, telling me that weekend on the yacht that he had talked to Mr. Trump and Ms. Meloni \u201cin the last couple of weeks.\u201d<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n

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\u201cI listened to \u2019em both,\u201d he said, speaking in his heavy Texas twang. \u201cAnd they both make sense to me.\u201d<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n

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Mr. Fertitta\u2019s yacht off the coast of Cefal\u00f9, Sicily.<\/span><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n
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Mr. Fertitta meeting Daniele Tumminello, the mayor of Cefal\u00f9, where some of his ancestors lived.<\/span><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n
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The president is \u201cupset with Giorgia Meloni,\u201d Mr. Fertitta conceded in the 90-minute interview as he spread his arms across the back of a large couch and rested his white-socked feet on a coffee table. \u201cAnd so he lets the world know it.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cIt doesn\u2019t affect my relationship or the American-Italian relationship,\u201d he added.<\/p>\n

There are those who feel Mr. Fertitta is not practicing much diplomacy during the worst public feud between American and Italian leaders in living memory. Mr. Trump is furious at Italy\u2019s decision not to support the war in Iran<\/a>, and Ms. Meloni has lashed out at Mr. Trump<\/a>, saying he picked a fight with the pope<\/a>.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n

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\u201cIt sounds like something that comes from a movie, from an Italian comedy, like the guy who wants to cruise around the coast,\u201d said Michele Masneri, a novelist and columnist at Il Foglio, an independent newspaper. \u201cThe job of an American ambassador, I\u2019d say, is like 60 percent being a high-scale tourist,\u201d Mr. Masneri added.<\/p>\n

His sailing has also attracted criticism for its cost to the Italian state. An opposition lawmaker has called for a government inquiry into how much Italy is spending on providing a police escort to secure the yacht. The Italian government declined to comment.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n

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Mr. Fertitta, the owner of a restaurant and casino empire as well as the Houston Rockets basketball team<\/a>, says it is all worth it.<\/p>\n

\u201cHow many people ever get to come on a boat like this?\u201d Mr. Fertitta said of Boardwalk, the sixth yacht that he has given that name. \u201cPeople love successful people. Everybody wants to be successful. And anybody who says they don\u2019t is just lying to you.\u201d<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n

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The way Mr. Fertitta sees it, giving Italians a glimpse of how the 0.1 percent live helps to make the kind of people-to-people connections that ambassadors are supposed to foster. Even if \u2014 or perhaps especially if \u2014 relations between the leaders of his home country and his host nation have deteriorated.<\/p>\n

By and large, though, the guests he hosts aboard the yacht come from a narrow band of Italian society. The mayor of Naples, Gaetano Manfredi, attended a reception on the yacht last month. \u201cThe people I met on the ship,\u201d he said, \u201cwere the people who represent the city\u2019s ruling class.\u201d<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n

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Onlookers watching the visit.<\/span><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n
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Mr. Fertitta on a tour of Cefal\u00f9.<\/span><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n
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Mariangela Zappia, Italy\u2019s former ambassador to the United States, said she saw value in Mr. Fertitta\u2019s approach because the yacht tour relegated the personal agita between the two leaders to \u201cthe background.\u201d Mr. Fertitta, she said, can \u201cdemonstrate village by village, port by port, that this relationship is in fact very lively and thriving.\u201d<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n

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Mr. Fertitta was not specific about how often he spoke to Italian officials, but Antonio Tajani, Italy\u2019s foreign minister, said in a statement that the ambassador had helped \u201cwhen we need to understand something.\u201d<\/p>\n