Laurel Wamsley
Laurel Wamsley is a reporter for NPR's News Desk. She reports breaking news for NPR's digital coverage, newscasts, and news magazines, as well as occasional features. She was also the lead reporter for NPR's coverage of the 2019 Women's World Cup in France.
Wamsley got her start at NPR as an intern for Weekend Edition Saturday in January 2007 and stayed on as a production assistant for NPR's flagship news programs, before joining the Washington Desk for the 2008 election.
She then left NPR, doing freelance writing and editing in Austin, Texas, and then working in various marketing roles for technology companies in Austin and Chicago.
In November 2015, Wamsley returned to NPR as an associate producer for the National Desk, where she covered stories including Hurricane Matthew in coastal Georgia. She became a Newsdesk reporter in March 2017, and has since covered subjects including climate change, possibilities for social networks beyond Facebook, the sex lives of Neanderthals, and joke theft.
In 2010, Wamsley was a Journalism and Women Symposium Fellow and participated in the German-American Fulbright Commission's Berlin Capital Program, and was a 2016 Voqal Foundation Fellow. She will spend two months reporting from Germany as a 2019 Arthur F. Burns Fellow, a program of the International Center for Journalists.
Wamsley earned a B.A. with highest honors from the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, where she was a Morehead-Cain Scholar. Wamsley holds a master's degree from Ohio University, where she was a Public Media Fellow and worked at NPR Member station WOUB. A native of Athens, Ohio, she now lives and bikes in Washington, DC.
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17 people with the Ohio-based Christian Aid Ministries remain missing after being kidnapped in Haiti. A gang has claimed responsibility and is reportedly asking for a ransom of $1 million per person.
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Even with government assistance and other efforts, more than 55% of Black and Latino households reported serious financial problems, compared with 29% of white households.
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A gang is demanding millions of dollars in ransom for 17 kidnapped missionaries. Faith-based humanitarian groups say their work demands balancing risk with the need to serve the most vulnerable. -
In emails dating back to 2011, Gruden reportedly used racist, misogynistic and homophobic terms. The messages emerged in an investigation of the Washington Football Club.
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A UPS delivery driver was among those killed in the crash in Santee, Calif. Two others who were injured were transported to a local hospital.
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Instagram and Facebook are under scrutiny after being accused of harmful body-image messages. We hear from teenagers who say Instagram can be a stresser — but it's hard to quit.
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As religious exemptions are now being sought in droves, their use raises concerns that they pose a serious public health risk. But some say vaccine mandates are too much, too soon.
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US Soccer says it's offering the men's and women's national teams "identical" contracts. The union for the women's team players is calling the announcement a PR stunt.
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Relief payments moved 11.7 million people from poverty in 2020, according to new Census Bureau data.
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There's new urgency to get billions of dollars in federal rental assistance to tenants and landlords. Memphis, without an eviction ban since July, has figured out some things that work.
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In Memphis, evictions have resumed. But there's a concerted effort to keep people in their homes, using innovative strategies to get federal rental assistance to those who need it.
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At eviction court in Columbus, Ohio, much of the work happens in the hallway just outside the courtroom. That's where tenants find lawyers to represent them, cases are mediated, and deals are struck.
