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Floor Speech
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Mr. RISCH. Mr. President, on a more credible note, I hope, I am here to speak on two noms that we have coming up. There is going to be a vote on confirmation of Thomas Barrack to be Ambassador for Turkiye and a vote on Tilman Fertitta for the nomination to be Ambassador for Italy.
I want to speak first to the nomination of Thomas Barrack for Ambassador to Turkiye. As you know--as everyone knows--Turkiye is a critical U.S. and NATO ally. I use that word ally judiciously. They have been the recalcitrant ally, from time to time, lately and have been difficult. Nonetheless, we have gotten through those things, but it has been far from lockstep with America in supporting our mutual interests.
While Turkiye hosts NATO and American forces and has supported efforts toward peace in Ukraine, it has troubling--troubling--ties to Russia and Hamas. Turkiye also has a difficult track record on human rights and has repressed dissent both in and outside of its borders.
Mr. Barrack is the right man to tackle this challenging post. He will help President Trump and Secretary Rubio protect national security interests from the many threats we face. I hope my colleagues will join me in supporting the confirmation of Thomas Barrack.
Next, I want to move to the nomination of Tillman Fertitta for Ambassador to Italy.
Italy remains a close ally, an important partner in Europe, and is a special place for a lot of Americans. While there are deep cultural ties, there remain a number of areas where significant improvement is needed.
On trade, U.S. producers have a hard time getting access to the Italian market, in part because of EU regulations--certainly, not the fault of Italy. But, nonetheless, the difficulty is there. There are also domestic industries that find creative barriers to keep U.S. products out.
In the security space, Italy remains below NATO's 2 percent spending requirement. This is really hard to understand, based on both the challenges Putin has created for European security but also due to the substantial security threats Italy faces from the Mediterranean and from North Africa.
I am confident that Mr. Fertitta will help address these issues and ensure the U.S.-Italian relationship only continues to grow stronger.
I encourage my colleagues to support his nomination. I know this nomination vote is going to be a bipartisan vote, and there are certainly Democrats that feel very strongly about Mr. Fertitta for good reason. He is a good man. He deserves the vote. I hope everyone will join us in voting for this confirmation.
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