Nicholas Kristof

I’m an Opinion columnist for The New York Times, writing about foreign and domestic issues.

What I Cover

I often report from around the world, but I’m also very interested in how we fix the rifts in America and help the tens of millions of people who have been left behind at home. I try to shine a light on topics that aren’t necessarily in the headlines but should be. I have a longstanding interest in health, poverty and women’s rights, partly because of a book that my wife, Sheryl WuDunn, and I wrote on empowering women called “Half the Sky,” and partly because the most consequential article I ever wrote was one in 1997 that led Bill and Melinda Gates on the path to embracing global health as a focus for their foundation.

My Background

I live on the family farm in rural Oregon that I grew up on, and more than a quarter of the kids on my old school bus have died from drugs, alcohol and suicide. That has seared and shaped me as much as my Harvard education or Oxford studies as a Rhodes Scholar. After a law degree and then Arabic studies in Cairo, I joined The Times in 1984, working as bureau chief in Hong Kong, Beijing and Tokyo before becoming a columnist in 2001. My wife and I jointly won a Pulitzer Prize for covering the bloody Tiananmen Square crackdown in China, and I won a second Pulitzer for coverage of the Darfur genocide. I also picked up an Emmy for a video about Covid. I’ve written a number of books; my next one is a memoir called “Chasing Hope.” Oh, and on the side, I backpack, run (including, briefly, for Oregon governor) and make Kristof Farms hard cider.

Journalistic Ethics

When you begin your journalism career in a tiny town, you see the impact on individuals when your coverage wounds them. So I deeply believe in tough journalism, but not at the expense of fairness. I try to reach out to people I’m going to criticize, saying something like: “I think I’m going to take a whack at you in my column and would like to hear what you have to say.” I try to dig deep and use my column to spotlight issues that deserve a place on the public agenda, for I’m very conscious that journalism is a responsibility and can make a real difference — if we’re fair and win the public trust. All Times staff are also, of course, governed by conflict-of-interest rules in The Times’s Ethical Journalism Handbook.

The best way to reach me is through my assistant, Spencer Cohen, [email protected]. I do read incoming messages, but I don’t always have time to respond to messages.

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