Tilman Fertitta, a Texan-Sicilian businessman for the US embassy in Italy

As ambassador to Italy, Donald Trump did not choose a career diplomat, but a billionaire businessman who loves being in the spotlight - in sports as in reality TV - and who in many ways resembles the American president himself.

Tilman J. Fertitta 'is a man who cuts to the chase and knows how to get what he wants', Trump repeated to friends at his Mar-a-Lago estate in Florida, immediately proposing him for the US embassy in Rome. In the Senate in Washington - after the nomination - Fertitta explained that the three main issues to be addressed with the Italian government would concern US oil purchases, Italy's relations with China and military spending in NATO. "I'm looking forward to doing more business and bringing the trade gap from $45 billion to much less," he said in reference to the US trade deficit, in dollars, with Italy: an obsession, that of the import-export deficit that led the Trump administration to unleash the tariff war against the world.

A Texan from Galveston, 68 years old, descendant of a Sicilian family from Cefalù, which emigrated to the United States at the end of the 19th century, two marriages and four children, Fertitta is not an early Trumpian, but he has wholeheartedly financed the Republican campaign and won over the tycoon with 'a mixture of candour, cunning and complacency', according to sources close to the White House.

Trump was impressed by the story of the self-made man who brought Fertitta to success starting from the family restaurant in Galveston, and without completing his studies: according to Forbes, Fertitta is now 'the richest restaurateur in the world', with an estimated fortune of 10.7 billion dollars. He owns hundreds of restaurants and the luxury hotel chain, Landry's. He recently became the major shareholder in the Wynn Resorts hotels and casinos. But he is also the owner of the Houston Rockets Nba basketball team, and was the star of the Billion Dollar Buyer TV programme.

"I am grateful to President Trump for the trust he has given me," he said in Rome, thanking President Sergio Mattarella, and promising "even stronger ties between the United States and Italy."