Renato Guerino Turano (2 October 1942 – 5 December 2021) was an Italian and American politician and businessman. He served in the

Italian Senate The Senate of the Republic (), or simply the Senate ( ), is the upper house of the bicameral Italian Parliament, the lower house being the Chamber of Deputies. The two houses together form a perfect bicameral system, meaning they perform iden ...

from 2006 to 2008 as a representative of Italian citizens in North and Central America and was re-elected to the same position in the 2013 Italian general election.

Early life and private career

Turano was born in Castrolibero,

Calabria Calabria is a Regions of Italy, region in Southern Italy. It is a peninsula bordered by the region Basilicata to the north, the Ionian Sea to the east, the Strait of Messina to the southwest, which separates it from Sicily, and the Tyrrhenian S ...

Italy Italy, officially the Italian Republic, is a country in Southern Europe, Southern and Western Europe, Western Europe. It consists of Italian Peninsula, a peninsula that extends into the Mediterranean Sea, with the Alps on its northern land b ...

, and moved to the United States with his family at age fifteen. He attended the

University of Illinois at Chicago The University of Illinois Chicago (UIC) is a public research university in Chicago, Illinois, United States. Its campus is in the Near West Side community area, adjacent to the Chicago Loop. The second campus established under the Universi ...

from 1962 to 1966 and returned in 1990 for a

Master of Business Administration A Master of Business Administration (MBA) is a professional degree focused on business administration. The core courses in an MBA program cover various areas of business administration; elective courses may allow further study in a particular ...

(MBA) degree. Turano also held an Honorary Doctorate in Letters from the University of Wisconsin-Parkside. Turano's family purchased a small Chicago baking company in 1962, renamed it as the Turano Baking Company, and eventually built it into one of the largest

artisan bread The hearth bread (also known as rustic bread, artisan bread, sometimes "French bread") is a "freestanding" (made without a bread pan) loaf baked at high temperature (up to 500 °F, frequently using steam) that is both crusty and chewy. The hig ...

producers in North America. Turano worked for the company in his youth and became its president and chief executive officer in 1982. He served as chair of the American Bakers Associations (ABA) in the 2000s and led a march of eighty bakers to

Capitol Hill Capitol Hill is a neighborhoods in Washington, D.C., neighborhood in Washington, D.C., located in both the Northeast, Washington, D.C., Northeast and Southeast, Washington, D.C., Southeast quadrants. It is bounded by 14th Street SE & NE, F S ...

to lobby for sector relief during a commodity crisis affecting wheat. In 2009, he was described as one of the twenty most influential baking managers in America. Turano has been active in the Italian-American community for several decades. He founded Chicago's Casa Italia, served on the National Italian American Foundation (NAIF), and from 1996 to 2006 was an American consulate to the Region of Calabria, representing Calabrian Americans at annual conferences in Italy. Turano received a special achievement award from the NIAF for public service in 2007.

Senator

Turano was elected to the Italian Senate in the 2006 general election, the first in which persons with Italian citizenship living overseas were able to elect their own representatives. Turano was elected to represent voters in North and Central America, and he credited

Canadian Canadians () are people identified with the country of Canada. This connection may be residential, legal, historical or cultural. For most Canadians, many (or all) of these connections exist and are collectively the source of their being ''C ...

support as vital to his victory. His party,

Romano Prodi Romano Prodi (; born 9 August 1939) is an Italian politician who served as President of the European Commission from 1999 to 2004 and twice as Prime Minister of Italy, from 1996 to 1998, and again from 2006 to 2008. Prodi is considered the fo ...

's The Union, won the election, and Turano helped consolidate its narrow majority in the Senate. A political moderate, he defended the Prodi administration's centrist course in a 2006 interview with the ''

Chicago Tribune The ''Chicago Tribune'' is an American daily newspaper based in Chicago, Illinois, United States. Founded in 1847, it was formerly self-styled as the "World's Greatest Newspaper", a slogan from which its once integrated WGN (AM), WGN radio and ...

'', saying that the government was shifting Italy from its recent "quasi-socialistic" history.Frances d'Emilio, "Overseas Voters May Decide Italy Election," ''Associated Press Newswires'', 21 March 2006, 04:44
"Renato Turano: Bakery chief rises to roles in business, Italian politics,"
''Chicago Tribune'', 6 November 2006, accessed 27 July 2011. Turano sought re-election in the 2008 general election, but was unsuccessful. Turano actually received more first preference votes than any other candidate in North and Central America, but the governing coalition's party list (renamed as the Democratic Party) narrowly lost to

Silvio Berlusconi Silvio Berlusconi ( ; ; 29 September 193612 June 2023) was an Italian Media proprietor, media tycoon and politician who served as the prime minister of Italy in three governments from 1994 to 1995, 2001 to 2006 and 2008 to 2011. He was a mem ...

's People of Freedom. He was re-elected in the 2013 general election, again as a candidate of the Democratic Party.

Electoral record

References

External links

Partito Democratico page
(in Italian)

(in Italian) {{DEFAULTSORT:Turano, Renato 1942 births 2021 deaths People from the Province of Cosenza Democratic Party (Italy) politicians Senators of Legislature XV of Italy Senators of Legislature XVII of Italy Italian emigrants to the United States Politicians from Chicago University of Illinois Chicago alumni