A prominent NBA team owner was among three of President Donald Trump\u2019s diplomatic nominees confirmed by the Senate on Tuesday evening.<\/p>\n
Tilman Fertitta, owner of the Houston Rockets and CEO of Landry\u2019s Restaurants group was confirmed as the upper chamber to be Trump’s ambassador to Italy and San Marino by a margin of 83-14.<\/p>\n
Investors Tom Barrack and Warren Stephens were also up for ambassadorship posts to Turkey, and the United Kingdom and Northern Ireland respectively.<\/p>\n
Barrack\u2019s nomination passedby 60-36 Stephens was confirmed 59-39.<\/p>\n<\/p>\n
Fertitta is a GOP donor and has spoken fondly of Trump\u2019s business sense.<\/p>\n
During Trump\u2019s first term, Fertitta told CNBC the president was doing ‘a fantastic job for the economy.’<\/p>\n
‘Businesses are booming, unemployment is low. He understands what drives this country,’ Fertitta said in 2018.<\/p>\n
Fertitta\u2019s praise of Trump often steers more toward business-focused than overtly-political, as in the CNBC interview.<\/p>\n
Trump\u2019s choice of Barrack played into two different aspects of the investor\u2019s history.<\/p>\n
Before he was a friend of the future president\u2019s, Barrack served as an undersecretary in the Reagan Interior Department, focusing on energy policy including Middle East oil.<\/p>\n<\/p>\n
Barrack, who is fluent in Arabic, would therefore fit well with a Turkish ambassadorship.<\/p>\n
Later in that decade, Barrack helped Trump secure financing for his short-lived ownership of the Plaza Hotel \u2013 during which time the future president famously told a lost Kevin McCallister its lobby was ‘Down the hall, and to the left’ in 1992\u2019s Home Alone 2: Lost in New York.<\/p>\n
The two real estate moguls remained friends in the years after Trump ultimately gave up the Midtown landmark.<\/p>\n
Barrack was a strong supporter of Trump\u2019s first presidential campaign and raised millions for his first inauguration\u2019s events.<\/p>\n
Stephens\u2019 family bank has a footprint in London, and he is a noted fan of the Tottenham Hotspurs Premier League soccer team, which draw parallels to his ambassadorship nomination.<\/p>\n
The billionaire will be the eyes and ears for Trump in London, where the president has a cordial relationship, albeit one wherein lies a politically contrasting view of global politics, with Prime Minister Keir Starmer of the Labour Party.<\/p>\n
Stephens has a history of donations to Republican causes and many Arkansas candidates, per OpenSecrets.<\/p>\n
Recipients have included former Sens. Mark Pryor, D-Ark., Mitt Romney, R-Utah, Bob Dole, R-Kan., ex-Arkansas Govs. Asa Hutchinson and Mike Huckabee, and media executive Steve Forbes\u2019 presidential run in 1995.<\/p>\n<\/p>\n
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