ROMA (ITALPRESS) – “Now more than ever it is important that the Niaf act as a bridge between the United States and Italy”. Robert Allegrini, president of the National Italian American Foundation (Niaf), said this in an interview with Corriere della Sera. “I have been on the board for many years, involved in Italian-American organizations since the 1980s, also as executive. One of my goals is to ensure that Italian Americans fully appreciate the richness of their history. In many cases their grandparents who arrived here did not know Italian history – explains Allegrini -. They came from villages, they knew the kitchen and the church, which are very important, but there are many other important things in Italian culture. To young Italian Americans I say that they can make America better by making it more Italian, because Italians have a sense of the family that is rapidly losing in this country, and a great sense of humanity (not by chance Italy contributes so much to peacekeeping missions). We want to be an organization that looks to the future and not only to the past and represents a vision of the modern American. It makes me mad when American journalists speak of European allies citing only Great Britain, France and Germany, as if Italy did not exist.”.
“We have supporters like Maria Bartiromo, Mike Pompeo, Nancy Pelosi… people who normally would have nothing in common, but unite them the fact that they are Italians – explains Allegrini -. The chairman, John Calvelli, has spent much of his life in democratic politics and this does not prevent us from working well together. It is the first time for 50 years that both the chairman and the president speak Italian, which gives us more credibility in Italy. We worked to ensure that the US consulate remained open in Florence when there were closing voices for Doge’s cuts (the department of Elon Musk, ndr), we collected 14 bipartisan signatures of the Italian American delegation at Congress to remove duties on pasta. We send Italian-American university students to visit Italy for the first time, so that they can discover the land of their ancestors and now we bring young professionals to the Ambrosetti forum in Cernobbio and Rome to meet the MPs – he continues. They will be the future leaders of our foundation and if they have to learn what Italy is from TV would be a very distorted vision. We want to make sure they have an accurate representation.”.
– photos of NIAF press office repertoire –
(ITALPRESS).
