Transcript: Mayor de Blasio Speaks With Reporters in Grassano, Italy

July 24, 2014

Mayor Bill de Blasio: Grassano [inaudible] this beautiful family tree. It goes back to my grandmother, great-grandparents, and great, great grandparents. And also the family from Sant’Agata, the same. So, it’s a beautiful moment, and a moment I feel in my heart, a lot of appreciation. Americani first? On topic Americani.

Question: Mr. Mayor, can you tell us a little bit about that moment in front of your grandmother’s house. Telling your children – were they interested about the story? You were taking pictures?

Mayor: Absolutely I think like so many Americans, they start without a natural sense of heritage because we’re a new country. And this trip for my children has really immediately deepened their sense of heritage because they knew relatives, but they didn’t understand how they connected to each town. For example, Chiara has a cousin in Rome and she didn’t understand exactly how she was related to her. They’re the same exact age and they get along wonderfully, but I showed her that there in that house was their common ancestor, Maria, who was the great-great grandmother of Chiara and the same of her cousin in Rome. So it’s an amazing moment, you could see the revelation, the look of revelation on her face knowing this is exactly where here family is from and this is how she connects to so many other people, and the same standing in front of my grandfather’s house in Sant’Agata. So I think it’s very different to tell stories or read about it, but to actually experience your heritage and see the place you are from so specifically is very, very powerful.

Question: Was this like the city council of –

Mayor: Yes it was, that was the City Council.

Question: And how did you feel, I mean were you excited to see it?

Mayor: Very much at home. I said to them – I’m glad we won all the votes – because they had a moment when they said ‘Who’s in favor?’ and people were hesitating, and I was like wait a minute [laughter] I’m like we better start lobbying here.

Question: And that was the vote on your citizenship?

Mayor: That was the honorary citizenship. But that’s their city council, and they have a president of the City Council, and the mayor sits there too. And they all vote. It was moving on a human level and a family level, and it was also a lot of fun to meet in the place in a small town and think about my own experience as a City Council member. It was a very special moment.

Question: The mayor of Grassano spoke of how your visit could revive the town, raise its spirits – there is a lot of unemployment for young people in this region of the country, and he spoke of people leaving Grassano. Just your reaction to the economic situation around here.

Mayor: It’s a very tough situation in Grassano and the Basilicata region and all of Southern Italy, and it has been for a long time. And I think the idea that there’s something very good, very honorable, very important here, it’s important for people to be reminded because it’s not surprising. My own grandparents left Southern Italy in search of economic opportunity, because it was very limited even then, still limited today. But there’s so much beauty here, there’s so much human capital, there’s so much creativity. So I think it’s important in towns like Grassano to be reminded of how much they have. And sometimes an outsider has the ability to do that, I hope I have done that in some small way. But also to remember that, all of us who have origins in these towns really have gained so much from that. I could see when the president of the region was speaking, it reminded me of my mother and her sister, the way he spoke, the passionate way he spoke. And when they made the point about – I spoke the other day about my mother’s eggplant parmigiana. The mayor or the president of the council said she was taught that by Anna, who’s from Grassano. So the recipes I grew up the recipes that I grew up with were taught by [inaudible]. It’s all these things that give us strength and make us who we are. It’s important for us, children of immigrants, to remember that. But it’s also important to say back to the places we came from that they gave us this strength, they gave us this culture, and to remind them of their own strength in this process.

Question: I heard somebody on stage say the next time you return to Grassano, he thinks you’ll be President of the United States.

Mayor: That was very kind of them, but as you know, my work is very, very local. This is a celebration of heritage. I am impressed by their extreme pride [laughter] in saying something like that. But I am amazingly honored to be the mayor of New York City. And as you can see New York means so much to the people here. And it’s very, very touching to be here on that level. I look forward to coming back someday as a private citizen, too. [laughter]

Question: [In Italian]

Mayor: [Speaks in Italian] a sense of clarity [speaks in Italian]

Question: [In Italian]

Mayor: [Speaks in Italian]

Question: [In Italian] That’s why you chose such an intelligent woman as your wife.

Mayor: [Speaks in Italian]