Quil Lawrence

Quil Lawrence is a New York-based correspondent for NPR News, covering national security, climate and veterans' issues nationwide. Previously he was NPR's Bureau Chief in Kabul and Baghdad.

Lawrence started his radio career by interviewing con-men in Tangier, Morocco in 1995. He then moved to Bogotá, Colombia, and covered Latin America and the Caribbean for NPR, the BBC and the LA Times.

In the Spring of 2000, a Pew Fellowship sponsored his first trips to Iraq — that reporting built the foundation for the book Invisible Nation: How the Kurds' Quest for Statehood is Shaping Iraq and the Middle East (Bloomsbury, 2009).

Reporting for the BBC World Service, he traveled throughout the Arab world and to Sudan, Pakistan, Israel, Gaza and the West Bank.

Lawrence covered Iraq and Afghanistan for 12 years, including the fall of the Taliban in 2001, the invasion of Iraq in 2003, the second battle of Fallujah in 2004, as well as politics, culture, and war in both countries. In 2009 he joined NPR as Baghdad Bureau Chief, and then served as Kabul Bureau Chief.

In 2012, Lawrence returned to the U.S. to start a beat covering the millions of men and women who have served at war, both recently and in past generations. NPR is possibly unique among major news organizations in dedicating a full-time correspondent to veterans and the Department of Veterans Affairs.

Iraq and Afghanistan Veterans of America (IAVA) has honored Lawrence with its Award for Leadership in Journalism. His coverage of life after war won a Robert F. Kennedy Award, and he received a Gracie Award for a series on female combat veterans. His exposé of problems inside the VA caregiver program resulted in VA halting all expulsions from the program for one, and then three years.

Lawrence co-hosted Home/Front, a podcast about the civilian-military divide, which the New York Times recognized among the ten best podcasts of 2021. The series won an Edward R. Murrow Award for the episode "Marla's War."  

Lawrence edited Pictures on the Radio, a book of the late photographer David Gilkey's work for NPR News, which won the Marine Corps Heritage Foundation's Sergeant Major Dan Daly Award and was named Photography Book of the Year by PoYi.

In 2023, along with NPR's Chris Arnold, Lawrence broke the story of an error in the VA home loan that left veterans on the brink of losing their homes through no fault of their own. As a result of their investigation, the VA halted foreclosures nationally for a year while working to fix the problem. Their stories saved thousands of veterans and their families from losing their homes.

Originally from Maine, Lawrence studied history at Brandeis University, with concentrations in the Middle East and Latin America. He is fluent in Spanish and conversant in Arabic.