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 Pentagon correspondent Tom Bowman and Justice correspondent Ryan Lucas about another deadly U.S. strike on an alleged drug boat off the coast of Venezuela.
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A smartwatch maker and a popular running app are locked in a legal dispute -- and if it ends badly, runners are wondering how this will affect their ability to track their runs.
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The Trump Administration is making it harder to pass the civics test that applicants for U.S. citizenship must pass. It says the new test and other changes to the naturalization process are intended to ensure all new citizens are "fully assimilated."
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The Trump Administration is making it harder to pass the civics test that applicants for U.S. citizenship must pass. It says the new test and other changes to the naturalization process are intended to ensure all new citizens are "fully assimilated."
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NPR's Mary Louise Kelly talks to Keri Russell and Allison Janney about their roles in season 3 of The Diplomat.
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NPR's Mary Louise Kelly talks with Lee Saunders — president of the American Federation of State, County and Municipal Employees — about how federal workers are handling the latest round of layoffs.
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NPR's Mary Louise Kelly talks with Lee Saunders — president of the American Federation of State, County and Municipal Employees — about how federal workers are handling the latest round of layoffs.
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NPR's Mary Louise Kelly talks to David Miliband, the president and CEO of the International Rescue Committee, about the needs of Palestinians in Gaza moving forward.
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NPR's Mary Louise Kelly speaks with Dr. Hagai Levine, head of the medical team for the Hostages and Missing Families Forum, about the road to recovery for hostages just released from captivity.
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NPR's Mary Louise Kelly talks with Reese Witherspoon and Harlan Coben about their new thriller, Gone Before Goodbye.