“A dazzling new talent” with “rigour and high-hearted passion for searching out stories of injustice against people who are too often invisible in our world.” 

Tina Brown

His most recent investigation revealed that at least 34 Catholic priests and missionaries moved to the Pacific Islands after they abused or allegedly abused children in the United States, Britain, Australia, and New Zealand. In at least 13 cases, Church officials knew the men had been accused or convicted before the transfers, shielding them from scrutiny. In at least three cases, the men reoffended in the Pacific. The New York Times published the investigation on its front page on the same day that Pope Francis made his first visit to a Pacific Island nation.

In 2024, he was a lead author on a story for The Outlaw Ocean Project that revealed how China’s foreign fishing fleet has infiltrated the domestic industries of vulnerable nations around the world. The story was a finalist at the National Magazine Awards, which recognizes the best American magazine storytelling. That year he was also a finalist for the Livingston Award for International Reporting, which recognizes the best American reporting by journalists under 35, for two dispatches about the Marshall Islands for The New York Times. The first dispatch revealed the exhaustion through corruption and mismanagement of a multi-million dollar American trust fund for nuclear exiles, prompting inquiries in Congress and changes to a major treaty between the United States and the Marshall Islands. The second dispatch highlighted how hundreds of Pacific veterans were being denied V.A. care due to decades-old regulatory barriers. That reporting helped prompt the Secretaries of State and Interior to pursue reforms, which led to Congress requiring the V.A. to provide care in Micronesia and reimburse veterans who travel to the U.S. for treatment. 

At the 2023 Voyager Media Awards, Pete was named New Zealand’s Reporter of the Year, the country’s most prestigious journalism award. He is the youngest person since 1981 to receive that honor. Pete has a master’s degree in global politics from Columbia University and a law degree with first class honors from Victoria University of Wellington. Before journalism, he worked as a judge’s clerk in the New Zealand High Court and served as an infantry officer in the New Zealand Army Reserve. He has reported from thirteen nations, interviewed four prime ministers and presidents, and is yet to find any country better than New Zealand. 

He has received the Ochberg Fellowship to study trauma-informed reporting at Columbia University’s Dart Center, the FASPE Fellowship to study journalistic ethics in Germany and Poland, and the Lynton Fellowship in Book Writing from Columbia University. He has received funding to report on colonization and the environment in the Pacific from the Pulitzer Center for Crisis Reporting and the Acland Foundation. In 2022, Pete was awarded a Fulbright Scholarship to study at Columbia Journalism School in New York. He also received scholarships from Universities New Zealand and the Association of Foreign Press Correspondents for his study. Outside of journalism, he aspires to complete all of the Great Walks in Aotearoa.

Pete McKenzie is a journalist who writes about politics, foreign affairs, and the environment around the world, with a particular focus on the Pacific. He writes for The New York Times, TIME, The Guardian, The The Washington Post and The Economist, among others. His photography has appeared in The New York Times, The Washington Post, The Los Angeles Times and The Guardian. In 2024, he was selected as the Sir Harry Evans Global Fellow in Investigative Journalism. In that role, he works on long-term, long-form investigative projects for Reuters.