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Jared Kushner tells how he met Edi Rama on the Rothschilds' yacht and what was the reason he chose Sazan

2025-05-17 20:15:43Politikë SHKRUAR NGA REDAKSIA VOX
Jared Kushner and his family with Prime Minister Edi Rama in southern Albania, 2021

US President Donald Trump's son-in-law, Jared Kushner, has told how he met Albanian Prime Minister Edi Rama, expressing his admiration for the latter's vision to transform Albania.

During his speech delivered online at the Future Investment Initiative Forum held in Tirana, Kushner, who is one of the Forum's speakers, told the story of how he first met Prime Minister Edi Rama.

"So, like all things in life, everything takes its course. I was on vacation after we left the (US) government in the summer of 2021. We were on our friend Matt Rothschild's boat, they picked us up in Montenegro and then we started sailing to Corfu and spent a few days in Albania," Kushner initially said.

He then tells that one of the nights there, Prime Minister Rama went on his yacht.

“I hadn’t met him when I was in government, but I was very, very impressed by his vision for what he wanted to do with Albania, I really didn’t know anything about the country,” Kushner says of the meeting. “I didn’t understand the history and the darkness of communism and the terrible leadership that actually led that country to complete underdevelopment as a nation, but Eddie came on the yacht and one of the interesting things that attracted me was the fact that he seemed like a very skilled politician, a very strong and smart leader.”

"But - explains Kushner - also the fact that, since he was an artist in the past, I thought it would be very interesting to see how an artist was really running a place and building it, someone with amazing taste and great creativity. And so I was intrigued by that."

Kushner continues the story by saying that before heading to Corfu, they stopped at Butrint and were met with a spectacular view.

Kushner felt as if the landscape itself was showing him the potential of the place, with so much amazing beauty, where he and his wife Ivanka sunbathed, swam a lot, walked a lot, in a place that simply had extraordinary natural beauty.

“But it seemed like a place that nobody knew or understood and so they didn’t think much of it for about a year and then about a year later, we started looking at the opportunities in the Balkans and the partner that was leading that effort. I said, you know what, let’s go to Albania, I had such a good experience there. Go check it out, see if there’s something there,” Kushner further explains.

He continues with the story, showing how the Vlora Airport project was a big bonus and an added plus to the list of requests for major investments.

“And we were immediately drawn to where they were building an airport in Vlora and obviously a country will build an airport near the coast and the place that they think is the most beautiful, so we went there. We looked for opportunities and were able to find some incredible opportunities, so this really came from obviously a passion, and it came from a desire to build something that I think could be really unique in the world,” he concludes on this matter.

Why Albania?

“Well, you have moments where you think, is this really worth it? I know, what the hell am I doing this for, but I was very curious that we spent about a year, really understanding the market, the demographics, the trends, the double-digit growth of the country, the pace of Europe, but then you have to say, okay, is this place, which historically has a bit of a mixed reputation, going to be a clean place?” Kushner said, referring to his project for Zvërnec.

"Will the government do what it says it will do, or will you be able to get approvals? Without having to play funny games, will they be, how do I say, different. Will they keep their promises?" Kushner had asked himself.

He then admits that after his first visit to Albania, he spent almost a year getting to know the environment, understanding it, studying the market, together with a partner of his, who was the person on the ground and the point of reference for Kushner's decision-making.

“The more we got into the design,” Kushner explains, “the more we fell in love with what we were creating and felt the environment was perfect, but not without the great work of the field team, our field partners, and the Government, really creating a very pro-growth environment.”

He then recalls the situation with the American newspaper New York Times, which was the first to publish Sazan's project, designed by Kushner, and how questions were raised that the laws were favoring him to take these developmental steps in Albania.

He explains that he knew nothing about the laws and had confirmed this to the American newspaper. The NYT later admitted that the changes to Albanian law had come to grow and develop the country, to encourage investment and change.

"I was listening to the last panel a little bit and they were talking about what needs to happen in order for countries to grow and the government in Albania has done all these things and that leads to investment which leads to prosperity which leads to attention, which leads to tourism," he explained further.

According to Kushner, this leads to job growth, leads to wage growth.

"So, the right things are happening here and so I've been very, very proud to highlight this and you know, I've gotten a lot of great feedback from Albanians, when I go to the country and the Albanian diaspora. Even yesterday, I met a gentleman who said, you know, I'm from Albania, I'm going back this summer to Vlora. Hey, I've never been there and heard incredible things, and I really thank you for bringing so much promotion to our country, which I think is a real gem."

Why exactly Sazani?

Kushner emphasizes that above all, he has singled out the environment as a key part.

"So the natural environment and what makes this place so special is the environment that is there. And so we have hired Arup, who are one of the leading engineers in Europe, to help us with the right conservation programs. If we don't respect the environment, the development that we are going to create there is not going to be that special, so we have to make sure that we really preserve the environment," he explained.

In fact, according to Kushner, there was also a story circulating in the media that said they were damaging a river delta. But it later turned out that it was 8 miles away and had nothing to do with their project, so he thinks that together with the company, they have managed to get people to accept this.

"And when we publish the plans, people will see how we have embraced the local environment and really tried to do something that will improve it, but it all depends on the location."

For the latter, he mentioned the proximity to Italy and Greece.

"So this project is 60 miles from Italy, 60 miles from Corfu, and like I said, there's a new airport that's going to open very soon and it's going to be a 10-minute drive from this project, so the natural beauty is incredible."

Kushner adds: “The location is incredible and you’re right in the middle of the Mediterranean, but again, because of the bad history that this country had until the ’90s, it was really underdeveloped, so you don’t have that kind of opportunity in the Mediterranean where there’s been a lot of development and then everything is over-regulated, where nothing can be built and nothing can be done. So these things are coming together and we, I think empirically, felt like this made a lot of sense, so we’ve spent a lot of time and effort and capital to move this forward, and I think we’re going to be able to do something very spectacular, which we’ll be announcing very soon.”


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