Carrie Kahn
Carrie Kahn is NPR's International Correspondent based in Mexico City, Mexico. She covers Mexico, the Caribbean, and Central America. Kahn's reports can be heard on NPR's award-winning news programs including All Things Considered, Morning Edition and Weekend Edition, and on NPR.org.
Since arriving in Mexico in the summer of 2012, on the eve of the election of President Enrique Peña Nieto and the PRI party's return to power, Kahn has reported on everything from the rise in violence throughout the country to its powerful drug cartels, and the arrest, escape and re-arrest of Joaquin "El Chapo" Guzman. She has reported on the Trump Administration's immigration policies and their effects on Mexico and Central America, the increasing international migration through the hemisphere, gang violence in Central America and the historic détente between the Obama Administration and Cuba.
Kahn has brought moving, personal stories to the forefront of NPR's coverage of the region. Some of her most notable coverage includes the stories of a Mexican man who was kidnapped and forced to dig a cross-border tunnel from Tijuana into San Diego, a Guatemalan family torn apart by President Trump's family separation policies and a Haitian family's situation immediately following the 2010 earthquake and on the ten-year anniversary of the disaster.
Prior to her post in Mexico, Kahn was a National Correspondent based in Los Angeles. She was the first NPR reporter into Haiti after the devastating earthquake in early 2010, and returned to the country on numerous occasions to continue NPR's coverage of the Caribbean nation. In 2005, Kahn was part of NPR's extensive coverage of Hurricane Katrina, where she investigated claims of euthanasia in New Orleans hospitals, recovery efforts along the Gulf Coast and resettlement of city residents in Houston, Texas.
She has covered hurricanes, the controversial life and death of pop icon Michael Jackson and firestorms and mudslides in Southern California,. In 2008, as China hosted the world's athletes, Kahn recorded a remembrance of her Jewish grandfather and his decision to compete in Hitler's 1936 Olympics.
Before coming to NPR in 2003, Kahn worked for NPR Member stations KQED and KPBS in California, with reporting focused on immigration and the U.S.-Mexico border.
Kahn is a recipient of the 2020 Cabot Prize from Columbia Journalism School, which honors distinguished reporting on Latin America and the Caribbean. In 2010 she was awarded the Headliner Award for Best in Show and Best Investigative Story for her work covering U.S. informants involved in the Mexican Drug War. Kahn's work has been cited for fairness and balance by the Poynter Institute of Media Studies. She was awarded and completed a Pew Fellowship in International Journalism at Johns Hopkins University.
Kahn received a bachelor's degree in biology from UC Santa Cruz. For several years, she was a human genetics researcher in California and in Costa Rica. She has traveled extensively throughout Mexico, Central America, Europe and the Middle East, where she worked on an English/Hebrew/Arabic magazine.
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Since July, authorities have cut work hours, electricity and gas supplies. Those measures have prompted fears of a return to austere economic times. Meanwhile, Venezuela has cut subsidies to Cuba. -
Cuba has reported only three cases of Zika contracted in the country. The government credits its deployment of soldiers and civilians across the island to destroy mosquito breeding grounds.
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After the famous toucan received a prosthetic replacement, it's story has helped spark a national movement against harming animals in Costa Rica, where a new anti-abuse bill is also gaining traction. -
The Panama Canal opens an expanded lane Sunday that will allow megaships to pass. It's good news for the nation, but residents in the city of Colon, near the canal, think they're being shortchanged.
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One of the lesser known tales of the world migrant crisis is taking place in Central America, where hundreds of Africans are landing with dreams of making it to the U.S. -
Mexico City has its worst smog in more than a decade. The government has ordered cars off the street one day a week, but city planners say that isn't a long-term solution. -
Mexico's Supreme Court has issued the first of six rulings that could enable legalization of recreational marijuana use. Relatively few Mexicans consume it, but Mexico produces much of the pot used in the U.S.
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Saturday's ceremony ends a long fight for recognition of the staunch defender of the poor, who was assassinated in 1980. But some say the violence-wracked country is no better now than it was then.
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Unlike other exhaustive guides to Mexico's diverse regional foods, Mexico: The Cookbook was written by a Mexican. Margarita Carrillo's recipes aim for simplicity to lure American readers to explore. -
The Day of the Dead is a time when Mexicans remember loved ones with grand floral tributes. But the atmosphere is downbeat in the state of Guerrero, where 43 students are still missing.
