Mary Louise Kelly
Mary Louise Kelly is a co-host of All Things Considered, NPR's award-winning afternoon newsmagazine.
Previously, she spent a decade as national security correspondent for NPR News, and she's kept that focus in her role as anchor. That's meant taking All Things Considered to Russia, North Korea, and beyond (including live coverage from Helsinki, for the infamous Trump-Putin summit). Her past reporting has tracked the CIA and other spy agencies, terrorism, wars, and rising nuclear powers. Kelly's assignments have found her deep in interviews at the Khyber Pass, at mosques in Hamburg, and in grimy Belfast bars.
Kelly first launched NPR's intelligence beat in 2004. After one particularly tough trip to Baghdad — so tough she wrote an essay about it for Newsweek — she decided to try trading the spy beat for spy fiction. Her debut espionage novel, Anonymous Sources, was published by Simon and Schuster in 2013. It's a tale of journalists, spies, and Pakistan's nuclear security. Her second novel, The Bullet, followed in 2015.
Kelly's writing has appeared in the Wall Street Journal, The New York Times, The Washington Post, Politico, Washingtonian, The Atlantic, and other publications. She has lectured at Harvard and Stanford, and taught a course on national security and journalism at Georgetown University. In addition to her NPR work, Kelly serves as a contributing editor at The Atlantic, moderating newsmaker interviews at forums from Aspen to Abu Dhabi.
A Georgia native, Kelly's first job was pounding the streets as a political reporter at the Atlanta Journal-Constitution. In 1996, she made the leap to broadcasting, joining the team that launched BBC/Public Radio International's The World. The following year, Kelly moved to London to work as a producer for CNN and as a senior producer, host, and reporter for the BBC World Service.
Kelly graduated from Harvard University in 1993 with degrees in government, French language, and literature. Two years later, she completed a master's degree in European studies at Cambridge University in England.
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NPR’s Mary Louise Kelly talks to journalist Anshel Pfeffer about the Israeli public and international community's response to Netanyahu’s refusal to commit to a ceasefire amid hostage deaths.
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NPR's Mary Louise Kelly speaks with LeElle Slifer. Her cousin Carmel Gat was one of the six hostages recently killed by Hamas, and who's body was recovered over the weekend.
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For the first time in 18 years, an American man will play at the U.S. Open final. It's been an incredibly long drought for American tennis and part of a U.S. resurgence in the sport.
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Despite countrywide protests, Mexico’s controversial judicial reform bill advances through Congress and inches closer towards passing into law.
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A handful of state Attorneys General have filed a new lawsuit requesting the courts to block the Biden Administration from attempting a new round of student loan forgiveness.
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Telegram has become a prime tool used by the far right to communicate. But the arrest of Telegram founder Pavel Durov is prompting paranoia over whether it will remain secure and accessible.
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NPR's Mary Louise Kelly talks to David Bosco, professor at Indiana University, about Mongolia’s decision not to arrest Russian President Vladimir Putin, despite a warrant from the ICC.
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A dispute between Disney and DirecTV is interrupting broadcasts, limiting access to the U.S. open, the start of college football season and more during a crucial time for the industry.
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With the Paralympics in their second week, NPR’s Mary Louise Kelly speaks with Washington Post reporter Roman Stubbs on the biggest storylines of the 2024 games.
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These experts argue technological developments have changed warfare more in the past several years than the decades spanning from the introduction of the airplane.
