Quil Lawrence
Quil Lawrence is a New York-based correspondent for NPR News, covering veterans' issues nationwide. He won a Robert F. Kennedy Award for his coverage of American veterans and a Gracie Award for coverage of female combat veterans. In 2019 Iraq and Afghanistan Veterans of America honored Quil with its IAVA Salutes Award for Leadership in Journalism.
Lawrence started his career in radio by interviewing con men in Tangier, Morocco. He then moved to Bogota, Colombia, and covered Latin America for NPR, the BBC, and The LA Times.
In the Spring of 2000, a Pew Fellowship sponsored his first trips to Iraq — that reporting experience eventually built the foundation for his first book, Invisible Nation: How the Kurds' Quest for Statehood is Shaping Iraq and the Middle East (Bloomsbury, 2009).
Lawrence has reported from throughout the Arab world and from Sudan, Cuba, Pakistan, Israel, Gaza, and the West Bank. He covered Iraq and Afghanistan for twelve years, serving as NPR's Bureau Chief in Baghdad and Kabul. He covered 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 2012, Lawrence returned to the U.S. to cover 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.
A native of 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.
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California has set up a permanent task force of National Guard members to do what used to be occasional work fighting and preventing wildfires. -
As climate change causes more fires, National Guard crews across the country are reassessing their aid capabilities for natural disasters, draining manpower from the guards' role in national security.
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Ian Fishback was laid to rest Tuesday after having died in 2021. He was named one of Time magazine's most influential people in 2005 for blowing the whistle on torture by the U.S. military.
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A long political campaign for veterans hurt by toxic exposures resulted in the largest expansion of VA care in decades. Advocates are urging veterans to access retroactive benefits.
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On the 70th anniversary of an armistice that stopped the Korean War, veterans reflect, while some activists call on U.S. officials to officially declare the conflict over.
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Twelve years after repeal of the ban on gay and lesbian troops serving openly, no one in the military or Veterans Administration knows how many vets are still without the benefits they're owed.
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Twelve years after repeal of the ban on gay and lesbian troops serving openly, no one in the military or Veterans Administration knows how many vets are still without the benefits they're owed.
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Veterans rated VA hospitals higher than private facilities for things like patient satisfaction, hospital cleanliness and communication with nurses and doctors.
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President Biden has selected Air Force General CQ Brown to be the next Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of staff — the most senior member of the U.S. military.
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A new survey finds that support for extremist groups is generally lower among military veterans than in the general population.
